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The pale apparition of Natale startled them all. Frontispiece. 

See page 167 . 



THE 


LITTLE ACROBAT 

A STORY OF ITALY 

BY 

JANIE PRICHARD DUGGAN 

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY 
NANA FRENCH BICKFORD 


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BOSTON 

LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 
1919 



Copyright, 1919, 

By Littlb, Brown, and Company. 

All rights reserved 


Published, September, 1919 


StP 30 1919 


Nortnoolr 

Set up and electrotyped by J. S. Cushing Co., Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. 
Presswork by S. J. Parkhill & Co., Boston, Mass., U.S.A. 


©CU .536000 

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DEDICATED 


TO MEMORIES OF 

TWO LITTLE ANGELICALS ” OF ROME 
SPOTTISWOODE AND SUSIE 
BY 


CUDDIE 


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CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I Along the White Road 1 

II Nonna 12 

III In the Ring 26 

IV The Festival of San Lorenzo . . 39 

V A Gift for the Circus 55 

VI Separation 73 

VII The Caged Bird of the Fields . . 91 

VIII The Cage Door Opened .... 105 

IX The Flight of the Bird .... 121 

X On the Wing 133 

XI Fluttering a Little Farther . . 150 

XII At Last 167 


vii 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


The pale apparition of Natale startled 

them all Frontispiece 

Mrs. Bishop looked down upon the tent 

from the garden terrace . . . page 45^ 

The priest led Natale to the other end of 

the house “94^ 

Capitomholi, such as the boy who was 
here just now made in the circus at 
Cutigliano” “ 142 ^ 





THE LITTLE ACROBAT 

A STORY OF ITALY 


CHAPTER I 

ALONG THE WHITE ROAD 

T he July sunshine lay hot and 
golden over the fields of wheat on 
the Italian hillsides, and the deep 
shade of the chestnut woods along the 
road was more inviting than the white glare 
beyond. The sun stood directly overhead, 
and along the middle of that white, dusty 
road there was not an inch of shadow. 

A small brown house on wheels crept 
slowly along this sunny way, drawn by a 
queer, ill-matched team of three — a plump 
white horse with long, silky mane and tail, 
a large spotted horse with fierce eyes and 


2 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


nostrils, and a lean, little brown pony, with 
strangely twisted neck. 

Up and up, always a little higher up, the 
horses toiled with the house-wagon, as the 
road rose into the mountains. From the 
interior of the wagon came the sound of 
voices, mingled now and then with a com- 
plaining note, or an exclamation of pain. 
The travelers were very tired, and poor 
Pietro’s fever was rising with every turn of 
the wheels. 

Several men and a sturdy girl of fifteen 
walked beside the horses in the powdery white 
dust. Behind the big wagon lagged a boy 
of eight or nine years. This was Natale,^ 
a slight little fellow, with dusty lean legs 
and dragging feet. His light brown hair 
curled damply about his sun-browned fore- 
head, and he wore an old, misshapen hat 
set far back on his pretty head. His loosely 
fitting clothes were dingy with dust but 


' Pronounced Nah-tah'le. 


ALONG THE WHITE ROAD 


3 


Natale did not mind, for, presently, they 
would come to Cutigliano, the old, old 
town on the mountain side, and there they 
would camp out on the soft, green grass. 
And Natale knew from much experience 
that nothing could clean the dust from 
travel-stained clothes so well as rolling down 
the grassy slopes of the chestnut woods, 
with Niero and Bianco as companions. 

Of course the sun was hot; was it not 
always hot at noon of a summer’s day in 
the Apennines.^ But Niero did not com- 
plain, and why should Natale? 

Bianco had tired of trotting along at 
Natale’s side, and at the last stopping- 
place, when Pietro had had a drink of 
water from the wayside fountain, the tired 
little black dog had begged to be allowed 
to ride, and had been willingly taken in- 
side the wagon. 

Natale never asked to ride in the wagon, 
unless he were very tired and sleepy. They 


4 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


were rather crowded in there even without 
him, for Pietro took up a great deal of room, 
now that he had to lie down all the time. 
Besides, the other children, good travelers 
as they usually were, sometimes grew 
quarrelsome and made the mothers and 
the grandmother angry. Natale did not 
like quarreling and loud voices, so he al- 
ways preferred his resting times to be given 
him on the back of one of the horses. But 
now Tesore and II Duca were tired also, and 
they were so near Cutigliano, it did not 
matter if Natale did lag behind a little, 
always with big Niero for company. 

Niero was a large, lean, white dog with a 
closely sheared body. About his neck, 
however, he wore a fluffy collar of long 
white hair, and bracelets of the same 
adorned his four paws, while his long tail 
ended in a tuft, having very much the ap- 
pearance of a dishmop. Why this white 
dog should have been named Niero, mean- 


ALONG THE WHITE ROAD 


5 


ing black, the clown who had also named the 
little black dog Bianco, white, could have 
best explained. 

By and by, long after the gray church 
tower had come in sight and the red-tiled 
roofs of the town showed bunched together 
against the green of the wooded hillside, the 
travelers reached the arched stone bridge 
across the river at the foot of the mountain. 
Here the wagon made a halt before begin- 
ning the last steep climb to the town. 
Above, they could see the stone wall which 
was the boundary of the road winding by 
loops, one above the other, up the mountain 
side, but the town had now disappeared 
from view, so sheer was the rise of the 
chestnut woods. 

This halt gave Natale time to come up 
with the wagon, and then he sat down with 
a tired sigh on a heap of mending-stones by 
the roadside, in front of the wagon door. 
His legs ached with weariness, but this was 


6 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


no time to think of riding, as even the 
women and all the children but Pietro must 
alight now, to relieve the horses in the last 
pull up hill. Natale watched them descend 
from the wagon one by one, by the steps one 
of the musicians placed at the door. 

First came Nonna, the gifandmother of 
Rudolfo and Tito and the five other children 
of the blond acrobat, Antonio Bisbini. She 
was not Natale’s Nonna, of course, yet 
everybody called her Nonna, and why 
should not he, who had no grandmother of 
his own ? 

Nonna carried Tito in her arms and led 
Rudolfo by the hand. Then came Tito’s 
mother, the three-months’-old infant, Gigi, 
in her arms, followed by Olga, who held 
little Maria by the hand. Next, Natale’s 
own mama stepped down, glad to stretch her 
active limbs by walking^ after nursing 
Pietro for so many tedious hours. Then 
the rest of Bisbini’s children scrambled 


ALONG THE WHITE ROAD 


7 


out, aided by the music-man’s helping 
hands. 

On they went again then, the clown, who 
was Natale’s stepfather, walking at the 
horses’ heads, and cracking his long whip, 
and chirruping to them while the other men 
strode behind the wagon, pushing upon it 
with all their might at the steep places in 
the road. 

The women and children, meanwhile, left 
the road to climb the short cuts upward, 
leading directly from terrace to terrace, — 
mere paths paved with rough stones, here 
and there loosened and displaced by rushing 
rain-torrents of the past. The little ones 
bore the heat and the roughness of the way 
without murmuring, being allowed to 
straggle along as they pleased, now stop- 
ping to gather a red poppy from the edge 
of the wheat, now dropping on the ground 
to search for a briar afflicting some tired 
foot. Natale was not the last in the pro- 


8 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


cession now, for he was anxious to get 
to the top and see what the tall wheat 
and the green slopes were hiding from 
his eyes. 

At last they reached the wide turn in the 
road where the wagon must finally stop, at 
the edge of the town field. The wagon 
also came toiling upward, and now the good 
horses might rest. So these were unhitched 
from the wagon, and while one or two of the 
men led them up the steep, paved street into 
the village to find food and shelter for them, 
the others attended to the house-wagon, 
drawn close against the low stone wall 
inclosing the field, placing great stones 
against the wheels to steady it in its place. 
Now was Natale’s hour and the dogs’, and 
they understood this as well as he ! Over 
the low wall they scampered and down on 
the soft, hot grass they lay, rolling over and 
over down the gentle slope of the field until, 
suddenly, Natale found himself landing 


ALONG THE WHITE ROAD 


9 


directly upon his feet, with a whirring in his 
head, and the sound of distressed barking 
in his ears. 

The dogs had had the wit to stop on the 
very edge of a sharp descent which Natale 
had not noticed, and now they stood on the 
bank, half-a-dozen feet above him, their 
forefeet firmly planted on the brink of the 
grassy precipice, and their tufty tails high 
in the air, begging with all their might to 
know whether their dear little comrade were 
hurt. Natale was not hurt, but the jar 
of the descent gave him a queer feeling 
under the waistband of his trousers, and 
he sat down directly where he stood, 
on the lower terrace, turning his back 
upon the dogs. 

A fringe of bushes threw a narrow band 
of shade about him from above, and he 
made up his mind to stay there till some- 
thing should be made ready for dinner. 
He hoped he would not be wanted to fetch 


10 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


anything from the village, — he was always 
fetching something for somebody. He had 
heard his mother calling to her husband to 
bring a little meal for the polenta,^ when he 
should finish stabling the horses, and he 
knew there was wine left in the flask in the 
wagon. 

From where Natale sat he could look 
directly down upon the roof of a house far 
down by the stone bridge and could faintly 
hear the rushing of the little river Lima over 
the rocks. Presently he eased himself out 
on the grass at full length, with his arms 
crossed beneath his head. As he dropped 
off to sleep, he was thinking how well it was 
that there could be no performance in the 
tent that evening. He was sure that 
Arduina would laugh more than ever at 
his stiff little feats on the circus carpet if 
he should have to turn somersaults after 
the long tramp. 


1 Mush of corn meal. 


ALONG THE WHITE ROAD 


11 


\— 

Then Natale slept, with the great green 
mountains closing around him, and Bianco 
the black dog and Niero the white keeping 
watch above his head from where they had 
stretched themselves on the edge of the 
terrace in the sun. 


CHAPTER II 

NONNA 

N ATALE, as will have been dis- 
covered by this time, was an 
Italian circus boy, a cheerful, 
happy little soul, who loved his “profes- 
sion”, and whose ambition reached to the 
giddy height of some day rivaling even 
Antonio Bisbini in his wonderful trapeze 
performances. He loved everything con- 
nected with the life he led, — the long slow 
journeyings through his beautiful Italy, the 
camping out at night along the quiet roads, 
the open-air loungings in some village 
through the sunny days, until the evening 
should come and the oil lamps be lighted in 
the tent, and the people come crowding 


NONNA 


13 


in to see Arduina dance the tight rope, and 
little Olga do her wonderful turns and 
twists on the carpet, and to applaud An- 
tonio and the clown and the horses, and — 
yes, and himself too, little Natale, stiff as 
his short thin legs always were and hopeless, 
as Arduina declared, in his bows and scrapes. 

Besides the three musicians, there were 
two families in the strolling company. 
Giovanni Marzuchetti was the clown, also 
the stepfather of Paulo, Arduina, Pietro, 
Natale and little Maria, and husband of 
Elvira, the black-haired mother of the five 
children. This man had no children of his 
own but was kind in his rough, clownish way 
to Natale and the rest. 

It is not difficult to understand why 
Giovanni should have married Elvira and 
her family, when it was known that the 
woman brought to her husband a small 
fortune in the shape of her own wonderful 
skill as a rider of horses, and the little ones 


14 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


as possible acrobats of the future. They 
had been married for two years now, and 
if Giovanni had counted largely upon his 
ready-made family for speedy reenforce- 
ments in the “ring”, he must have become 
a little discouraged even by this time. It 
is true that Paulo and Arduina were well 
trained in the art of circus acting ; but poor 
Pietro, the middle-sized one, who was 
twelve years old, was always ailing and 
feeble. Sleeping out of doors in the marshy 
regions had developed in his system a 
chronic fever which could not be thrown 
off, even with the aid of Nonna’s assiduous 
doctoring, and lately the weakness had 
settled in one leg and foot, threatening 
permanent lameness. 

Natale, who came next, was agile enough 
when running about on his slim brown legs, 
but his funny stiff-legged somersaults and 
awkward antics in the ring were matters of 
jesting among the whole troop. Poor little 


NONNA 


15 


Natale, who did so wish to be like Antonio 
Bisbini ! 

Lastly there was Maria, who was a mere 
baby and as yet only just learning to stand 
upright on her stepfather’s head. 

But Antonio Bisbini, the father of the 
other family, was the star of the little troop 
of strolling players. Tall and lean and 
muscular, he stood six feet two in his san- 
dals. His blond hair and skin and strong, 
clear-cut features gave him the look of some 
stern young Viking from the cold forests of 
the North, yet this youthful -looking, ruddy 
athlete was already the father of seven 
young children. 

No one in the company, not even the 
clown, could hold a candle to Antonio in 
looks or in graceful skill. Natale was sure 
that the noblest and most beautiful figure 
in all Italy was that of Antonio Bisbini as 
he would step forth from behind the tent- 
curtain, ready to thrill the spectators about 


16 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


the ring. The flesh-colored tights clothing 
his limbs showed to perfection their sym- 
metry and grace, relieved by the brilliantly 
spangled hip garment of black velvet and 
fringe, while the proud glance of his gray 
eyes and the light tread of his feet never 
failed to impress the beholder. 

Antonio’s oldest, little red-haired Olga, 
tumbled and danced with all a healthy 
child’s love of activity and applause, and 
Oh ! how Natale envied her the perfect 
“wheels” she turned, one after the other 
with dizzying swiftness across the dusty 
strip of carpet in the ring. But the rest of 
Antonio’s seven were as yet too small to be 
useful as tumblers or dancers, and Nonna’s 
hands were always full, while their mother 
did her daring dances in the air. 

The three musicians, then, and Nonna 
completed this strolling band of twenty, 
with the two horses, the dogs and the 
twisted-necked pony. Poor Caffero had 


NONNA 


17 


grievously hurt his pretty neck one day 
when very young, while tied in his stall and 
leaping to reach his food from a manger 
set cruelly high. Since then he had trotted 
painfully through three years of going up 
and down the earth, with his brown head and 
long neck twisted far around to one side 
without the power of righting them. Caf- 
fero would have made a pretty part of the 
show had not this accident befallen him. 
As it was, he was good for little but helping 
to guide the house-wagon along the weary 
roads. Yet every one loved Caffero. 

On the day of the arrival at Cutigliano 
the two horses Tesoro and II Duca were left 
in their stalls in the village stables during 
the whole afternoon, while Caffero was 
brought down the steep village street and 
allowed to graze in the public field. Nonna 
herself had gone up for him with Tito in her 
arms, after the midday meal of polenta, or 
thick mush of yellow meal, had been eaten. 


18 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


As the trio passed through the narrow 
street of the village, many heads turned to 
wonder at the strangers — the gray-haired 
woman, the bright-eyed child in her arms, 
and poor Caffero, who always seemed 
pulling against the leading rope and try- 
ing to twist his head after something left 
behind. 

It was while Nonna, a little later, was 
tying Caffero’s rope to a tree in the field that 
she spied the two dogs asleep in the sun near 
the edge of the terrace. As Tito recognized 
them at the same time, and called them in 
his baby voice, the grandmother added her 
summons, and was rather astonished at 
their failure to obey. They bounded to 
their feet, it is true, but instead of scamper- 
ing to meet her, they stood still, quivering 
with nervous excitement and waving their 
tails in much perplexity. Then as Tito 
began to fret and belabor the air with his 
fists, Nonna started swiftly toward the 


NONNA 


19 


dogs with something threatening in her 
gait. 

But where were they, those lazy brutes, 
which a moment before had defied her and 
then had promptly disappeared? A few 
more hasty steps brought Nonna near 
enough to the edge of the descent to see 
both Niero and Bianco crouching over 
Natale on the lower terrace. The boy had 
been awakened by the sudden onset of his 
faithful friends, and lay looking lazily up- 
ward as Nonna and Tito peered over at 
him. 

‘‘Natalino!” the old woman exclaimed, 
and, at the word, Natale scrambled to his 
feet. 

‘‘I am ready! Where am I to go?” he 
asked hurriedly, preparing to creep up the 
bank. But Nonna only laughed and 
reached down a helping hand to the child, 
as he clutched at the long grass for sup- 
port. 


20 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


“Come and eat your polenta,” she said, 
when Natale stood at her side, the dogs 
panting close by. “I suppose they have 
saved you a bite. Why did you run away ? 
Though, as for that, you were not missed 
in all this hurly-burly of arriving. Now, 
Niero, stand on your hind legs and beg. 
See, Tito is fretting for you to do it — ” 
“But we haven’t a bone or a crust of 
bread for him, Nonna,” Natale pleaded. 
“See how sadly his eyes look at you. 
Giovanni always gives him a bone.” 

“There! take to your legs then, poor 
thing!” Nonna cried in a friendly way 
to the hungry dog. “Perhaps to-morrow 
there will be a bone. Who knows 

Natale ran off toward the wagon, followed 
by the patient animals, who perhaps were 
well assured that he was going to share with 
them his own scanty heap of polenta. 

The brown house on wheels leaned 
slightly inward against the stone wall for 


NONNA 


21 


security, as the hill’s incline was steep at 
this point. The door opened directly upon 
the top of the wall, which formed a broad 
and convenient doorstep, reached from the 
ground by a short ladder. About the 
wagon and in the field close by everybody 
was busy. 

The great canvas of the tent had been 
unpacked from the top of the wagon, and 
the two women sat on the ground patching 
the holes and thin places worn in it by long 
use. Some of the men were making trips 
back and forth from wagon and field, 
carrying sections of board for inclosing 
the ring. These were to be set up in their 
places by and by, when Antonio should have 
finished marking off the circle on the grass, 
with the hole in the center for the tent pole. 
There was nothing, as yet, for the children 
to do but loll in the shadow of the wagon, 
asleep or awake, and chatter among them- 
selves. 


22 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


As Natale and the dogs drew near, 
Elvira, the boy’s mother, looked up from 
her stitching and clapped her hand to her 
forehead on seeing them. 

‘‘Natale! I had forgotten the child. 
Little pest, where have you been, away 
from us all, and your dinner ? One would 
think you had friends in the town and 
had been taking your polenta in grander 
houses than ours here.” 

Natale replied to these mocking words 
with only a rather naughty shrug of the 
shoulders, and went to sit down on the 
lowest step of the short ladder against the 
wall. 

“Give him his polenta, Arduina,” Nonna 
called shrilly from a little way behind. 
“ He was asleep, Elvira, all tired out with 
walking to-day as much as any man among 
us. I keep my eyes open. Don’t scold the 
boy.” 

“One would think my Natale your own 


NONNA 


23 


grandson, Nonna,” Elvira replied, laughing 
good-naturedly. 

‘"All boys are as her own sons or grand- 
sons,” Nonna’s daughter-in-law interposed 
carelessly, as the old woman passed on with 
Tito, perhaps to see that Arduina gave 
Natale his proper share of mush. 

In Nonna’s big warm heart there was in- 
deed room for the sons and grandsons of 
those who were too sparing of motherly 
love and care for their own. The gray- 
haired woman had long ago accepted this 
wandering life for the sake of continuing 
near to her only son, Antonio, the acrobat, 
and Antonio’s children. When her boy at 
the age of twenty-two had given up every- 
thing that his mother thought of worth in 
the world — home, a decent, quiet life in 
it, books, school, a career as a priest — in 
order to marry Cara, a rosy, lithe-limbed 
rope-dancer out of Egypt, he had found that 
his mother was not going to be given up 


24 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


along with these. By and by, when the 
babies began to come every year or two, 
Nonna came to be appreciated even by the 
fantastic daughter-in-law given her by 
Antonio, while in the hearts of all the little 
ones Nonna was — well, Nonna, — and 
therefore everything good and patient and 
sweet. 

It was Nonna who cared for the ailing 
Pietro, who rubbed Natale’s stiff ankles and 
elbows with an ointment of her own inven- 
tion to limber them up, who thought to tuck 
Olga’s long red hair out of the way when 
practice time came and the curling locks 
would have teased the little face and shoul- 
ders turned upside down and hindside be- 
fore. It was Nonna who nursed the babies 
and put them to bed while the mothers rode 
the horses in the tent, and Nonna who led 
the poor pony about to ‘‘fresh fields and 
pastures new”, and Nonna who instructed 
giddy-brained Arduina in the simple myste- 


NONNA 


25 


ries of concocting savory stews out of next to 
nothing, and how to make corn meal for ten 
do service as polenta for twice as many. 
The little troop could not have done with- 
out Nonna, no, indeed ! 


CHAPTER III 

IN THE RING 

I T took all of that first day and most of the 
next to get everything into shape for 
an exhibition on the second night after 
the arrival of the circus troop at Cutigliano. 

The turf had been removed from the ring, 
or round space inclosed by the low panels 
of wood, and the tent pole erected, by the 
time the canvas was mended and the side 
curtains were ready to be hung. 

The sun was just about to slip over the 
mountain rim in the west when everything 
was done, and it only remained to draw the 
stout ropes and hoist the canvas into 
position. Natale was generally on hand 
when this was done, listening for the creak- 
ing of the pulley at the top of the pole, as 


IN THE RING 


27 


the dull yellow canvas slowly rose into 
position, till, all at once, it spread like a 
queer, pointed mushroom over the green 
grass of the field. 

It was a fortunate thing that there was 
no wind that first evening, for if there had 
been even a stiff breeze there would have 
been no performance. A very little wind 
caught under the canvas spread on that 
exposed hillside before it was securely roped 
into place might have carried it all away to 
be stranded in the tops of the chestnut trees 
below, and a new canvas for such a circo 
as that would have cost certainly three 
hundred francs. 

When at last the tent was raised, Gio- 
vanni hung above the entrance a broad 
strip of blue canvas with clowns’ and 
horses’ heads painted upon it, and the sign 
in large letters: ‘‘Circo Equestre”, which 
is Italian for “Circus with Horses.” 

Lastly, figured curtains of pale green 


28 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


calico were hung around the little vestibule, 
so that outsiders who had not paid the 
entrance fee might not peep inside and see 
what was going on, without payment. 

Now all was ready, and it was still early, 
although almost dark in the field. Among 
the mountains, where one lives perhaps at 
the foot or even half-way up the slopes, 
night falls early, because the sinking sun is 
hidden from sight over the mountain tops 
long before it really drops into the sea 
behind them. 

Yet it was not quite time to light the 
lamps inside the tent, as the performance 
was not to begin until half -past eight 
o’clock. Cutigliano was full of Italians, 
and a few English and Americans who had 
left the hot cities behind, with their churches 
and picture galleries and ruins, and had 
come to the pleasant hotels of the ancient 
mountain town to enjoy the fine air and 
the beautiful chestnut woods during the hot 


IN THE RING 


29 


summer months. These visitors would not 
be through with their dinners at the hotels 
before eight o’clock, while the servants and 
plain village folk would find a late hour 
convenient for coming down the hill to the 
yellow tent. 

At seven o’clock, however, the three men, 
with the big brass horn, the cornet and the 
drum, climbed the stony street into the town 
and made lively music in the little stone- 
paved piazzas^ or open squares, where the 
children played in the sunset light. 

By this time everybody in Cutigliano had 
learned what had been going on down in the 
field for the past two days, and many even 
of the rich strangers had made up their 
minds to go tb see the show, partly out of 
curiosity, partly out of kindly purpose 
to help the strolling players. It had been 
announced that six soldi^ or cents, would 
admit to the side of the ring where there 
would be benches and a chair or two for 


30 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


seats, while three cents offered room on the 
other side with a few boards and the green 
grass as accommodation. Visitors were 
invited to bring chairs for their sittings, if 
possible. 

The music sounded very brave and loud 
as it returned down the very steepest street 
of all, which ran between high walls past 
Madame Cioche’s English 'pension or board- 
ing-house and ended in the field. As this 
was a dark and even dangerous descent at 
night for the unwary, Antonio had driven 
a nail into a tree at the foot of the street, 
and had hung there a smutty tin lamp, with 
the light flaring and the smoke pouring 
from two long spouts. 

Nonna had beguiled most of the children 
away from the tent by this time, and was 
putting the youngest to bed in the wagon, 
while the others rolled over the grass be- 
hind the tent. 

Natale was as busy as a bee in the small 


IN THE RING 


31 


tent which opened out of the large one. 
This was the dressing room, and the diflPer- 
ent costumes of the actors lay in heaps on 
the boxes scattered about. 

As half-past eight o’clock approached, 
the boy became as excited as if this were to 
be his first appearance in public, and he 
kept lifting up the flap of curtain dividing 
the two tents to see how fast the seats were 
filling. The band had brought back a horde 
of village children in its train, and though 
few of these were possessed of the three 
cents charged for children, they served to 
keep up an appearance of bustle and enter- 
prise outside, where the band now played 
the National Hymn of Italy gaily in the 
light of the big lamp at the entrance. 

Gara, the mother of Olga and the rest of 
the seven, stood in the vestibule and took 
in the great copper cents which by and by 
began to pile up in the bowl on the table. 
She was a very striking person to look at. 


32 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


with her coal-black hair frizzed bushily on 
each side of her head, with her flashing 
black eyes and her heavy brows, her red, 
red lips and cheeks, and her scarlet and 
black gown. No one dared to slip in behind 
the rustling skirts or portly form of any- 
body without paying, for her piercing eyes 
seemed everywhere. Once or twice, when 
the crowds about the doors seemed to 
hesitate and to wonder whether, after all, 
it were worth while to expend six or even 
three cents for what was to be seen behind 
the curtain, the pretty little figure of her 
Olga was seen to flit, as if by accident, 
across the vestibule, the full light streaming 
over her little full blouse of yellow satin, 
and her pink feet tripping as if on air. 

The anxious half-hour of expectation 
ended in the sight of a full circle surrounding 
the ring, and then the band came inside and 
all the performers slipped into the smaller 
tent and hurried on their costumes. 


IN THE RING 


33 


The band played on ; Arduina danced a 
measured dance on the tight rope which 
was stretched near the ground; the clown 
made his funny jokes; Antonio performed 
his clever feats on the bars; Elvira rode 
the galloping horses with Cara dancing in 
and out and everywhere, while Giovanni 
cracked the whip and Paulo held the bar 
for II Duca to leap. The pantomime then 
brought shouts of laughter and loud hand- 
clappings from the spectators; and after- 
ward the tumbling began. 

There was nothing that Olga loved so 
much, and she showed it in every line of her 
chubby, yet nimble little figure as she came 
prancing into the ring, and then went heels 
over head, over and over again, without 
stopping to breathe, as far as the strip of 
dusty carpet stretched. Then back again 
she tumbled, only stopping to toss a stray 
wisp of hair from her flushed face. 

Next Arduina came tripping in, and over 


34 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


and over she went too, not so gracefully and 
daintily as Olga had done, for Arduina was 
getting a little too large for that kind of 
thing, — a great girl of fifteen years. 

The clown followed Arduina, dressed in 
his clumsy suit of black and white, and what 
a farce his tumbling was, to be sure ; only 
the spectators must have known that he 
failed in order to make them laugh at his 
awkwardness, and make merry they did. 

Somehow Natale never quite enjoyed the 
laughter which often accompanied his own 
performances, and now his time had come. 

^‘Ecco! Natalino!” called his step- 
father, the clown, rushing behind the cur- 
tain all breathless and covered with dust. 
“Over and over and over you go, youngster, 
without stopping to sneeze between ! ” 
Natale was such a little fellow, so much 
smaller than Olga even, that many of the 
faces outside the ring softened at sight of 
him, as he darted out into the light of the 


IN THE RING 


35 


lamps and then halted to make his funny 
little salute. He was dressed in imitation 
of the clown, in long black trousers and a 
tailed black coat, with a pointed white 
waistcoat reaching below his waist. With 
an earnest seriousness very different from 
Olga’s smiling grace, Natale turned his first 
somersault, paused on his back, turned 
another jerkily, while the little boys watch- 
ing him hooted, and a ripple of laughter ran 
around the ring. Back again he came, 
however, his thin black legs sprawling in 
air, and his pale little face flushing with the 
exertion. On his feet again, he clapped one 
hand to the back of his neck, bobbed his 
head to the spectators, and trotted off 
behind the friendly curtain, satisfied that 
he had, at least, done as well as usual, and 
pleased with the loud clapping attending 
his exit. Indeed, there was a clapping and 
a calling out of something with laughing 


voices. 


36 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


'picino! 11 picino!''^ 

"‘You will have to go back, Natalino,’’ 
laughed the clown. “Salute them and 
stand on your head, boy, but don’t lose it 
on the way.” 

The music played loudly, and Natale 
stepped gravely back again, made his odd 
little bow, and fell over on his hands as the 
first step toward standing on his head. 
Poor, stiff little legs ! It took more than 
one effort to throw them into an upright 
position above his head, but finally he really 
did accomplish it, and stood thus several 
seconds while the shouting and laughing 
went on. 

When Natale had disappeared a second 
time behind the curtain, there were a few 
grave faces among the laughing ones looking 
on. An English lady whispered to her 
companion and sighed. 

“The poor little fellow is evidently afraid 


“ The little boy ! The little boy ! 


IN THE RING 


37 


to disobey that dreadful clown/’ she said. 
“Did you see how he trembled as the man 
stood over him, when he tried to stand on 
his head ? Something ought to be done to 
put a stop to this, Betty.” 

“The child looks weak, as if he were not 
very well fed,” Betty apswered, “but I do 
not think he looks unhappy. And the 
clown was certainly smiling, and seemed to 
be standing by as if to help the little boy 
accomplish his wonderful feat, I thought. 
Don’t distress yourself. Aunty. He is just 
learning, it may be, and they bring him in 
to contrast him with that little beauty who 
turned the ‘wheels.’ Send the boy some 
good bread and meat to-morrow, and that 
will be better for him than our empty 
sympathy.” 

But “Aunty” was not satisfied, as we 
shall see. 

The last act of the evening again brought 
Natale to the fore. The big spotted horse. 


38 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


II Duca, was again brought into the ring, 
and after he had cantered gaily around 
inside the ring many times, to the music 
of a schottisch, striking terror to the ladies 
occupying the front seats, with their knees 
pressed against the low barrier, the clown 
suddenly called a halt and caught the 
bridle of the panting steed. Gently the 
solemn strains of the ‘‘Dead March” 
sounded through the tent, and II Duca fell 
slowly and painfully upon his knees, and 
then rolled over upon the ground, appar- 
ently dying. The light dust of the ring 
stirred under the beast’s laboring nostrils, 
and deep groans issued from his throat, 
while Giovanni stood mournfully by and 
the music played on. 


CHAPTER. IV 

THE FESTIVAL OF SAN LORENZO 

S UDDENLY the small black figure of 
Natale appeared, kneeling at the 
horse’s side, although no one had 
seen him slip in. With his hands clasped in 
distress, he lifted his voice in such a dis- 
consolate wail that even Betty started and 
wondered if the horse could be really dying. 

The solemn march was still sounding in 
the tent, and before speaking the clown gave 
the spectators full time to take in the tragic 
tableau. Then he exclaimed briskly : 
"‘What are you crying about, boy?” 
“Because our horse is dead.” 

“Do you think he is quite dead, Natale ?” 
“Oh, quite,” wailed the child. 


40 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


“Get up and feel his pulse, boy. If there 
is any pulse he is not dead.” 

Natale went nearer and took one of the 
great hoofs of the horse fearlessly into his 
little hands, and felt for the “pulse.” 

“Well, what do you find?” asked the 
clown impatiently. 

“There isn’t any pulse,” the little fellow 
wailed again, laying down the big black 
hoof with the utmost tenderness. 

“Too bad,” quoth the clown, taking his 
seat deliberately on the prostrate horse, 
which lay as motionless as if certainly dead. 
Then, all in a moment, Natale’s manner 
changed, and he skipped around in front of 
Giovanni, remarking glibly that the gentle- 
man had found a beautiful sofa to sit upon. 

“And I shall have a kiss to prove that the 
beast is not dead,” exclaimed the clown, 
chirruping a little and smacking his lips. 
And the great brown head of the horse 
lifted itself from the dust, the graceful neck 


THE FESTIVAL OF SAN LORENZO 41 


turned, and II Duca actually kissed his 
master, then scrambled hastily to his feet 
as if glad for that job to be over, while 
Giovanni hurried him out of the ring. 

‘‘Such silly jokes!” commented Mrs. 
Bishop, otherwise Aunty, as the perform- 
ance ended, and the rollicking crowd poured 
out of the tent. “ Think of my having spent 
two whole hours listening to them, and all 
on pins too, for fear that poor, ill-used child 
should be forced to do some other un- 
christian thing.” 

“But, Aunty, what did you expect when 
you came?” Betty asked impatiently. 
“Surely the little show was not bad, and 
there was actually nothing but what was 
quite decent in every way.” 

“ I call it ‘ bad ’ to beat and starve children 
into turning themselves into monkeys.” 

“If people would not go to see the 
‘monkeys’ it would be stopped,” was 
Betty’s retort. 


42 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


“Well, I am sure I only went to oblige 
Mrs. Choky,” Aunty said in an injured tone. 
“ She said she thought we ought to encourage 
the poor people on their first night. But it 
will be my last night there, as I shall very 
soon inform her. ‘Encourage’ them to 
martyrize that poor child, indeed!” 

From the first performance in Cutigliano, 
therefore, Natale’s trouble began, although 
he did not know it. Contented and tired he 
lay down in his corner of the brown house 
on wheels and went to sleep, while the men 
let down the big yellow canvas of the large 
tent and furled it about the pole. But 
first, he ate his supper of macaroni with 
the rest of the actors, gathered in the small 
tent behind. Midnight suppers were the 
rule on the nights when there were per- 
formances, as it would have been at the 
risk of upsetting their stomachs in more 
ways than one to eat food beforehand. 

Later, the stars kept quiet watch above 


THE FESTIVAL OF SAN LORENZO 43 


the little encampment, where even Pietro 
slept well, with the open house door admit- 
ting the fresh air of the mountains. 

For ten days the yellow ‘‘mushroom” 
spread over the grass of the field, although 
very much in the way of the fine city gentle- 
men, playing at ball with bats like tambou- 
rines. The noisy music at night and the 
cheering in the tent may have kept the 
invalids in the nearest boarding-houses 
awake and nervous, and the people at large 
may have grown tired of the performances 
which they soon learned by heart, but no 
one felt inclined to hustle the poor people 
away, and no one grumbled except Mrs. 
Bishop. 

There was something pathetic about the 
clown in his everyday dress, his gayety and 
paint all gone and the deep lines of his face 
showing too plainly in the garish light of 
day, as he pottered about the tent, adjust- 
ing ropes, and keeping off the village boys 


44 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


who would throw stones upon the old 
canvas, or play hide and seek among the 
curtains. It gave one a queer feeling, also, 
to fancy the drooping figure of Pietro, with 
his pure little face like alabaster, a member 
of the “wicked circus troop.” 

This child was perhaps twelve years old, 
and he had the face of an angel. He had 
begun to lose his daily feverishness after a 
week in the mountains, and was soon able 
to limp, and later to run feebly about the 
field with the village boys. 

But Natale, spidery little Natale, inter- 
ested every one more even than did Pietro. 
Yet he looked only an everyday lad during 
the long summer days, when he trotted up 
and down, to and from the town, carrying 
now a bowl of this, now a flask of that, 
but always carrying something. To most 
people he seemed as happy as the days were 
long, just as ready for a chat with a strange 
foreigner who might address him in broken 



Mrs. Bishop looked down upon the tent from the garden terrace. 

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THE FESTIVAL OF SAN LORENZO 45 


Italian as with old Sora Teresa who sold 
fruit and vegetables in the piazza, and who 
Sometimes presented him with a ripe red 
tomato, or a slice of melon all green and 
pink. 

But Mrs. Bishop looked down upon the 
tent from the garden terrace of Madame 
Cioche’s boarding-house every day, and 
slowly formed a plan for making Natale’s 
life happier. Poor little Natale ! 

The terrace garden above the field was 
shaded with plane trees and the rhountain 
ash, and the grass was soft and richly green. 
Each afternoon some of the boarders would 
gather at the palings on the edge of this 
garden and watch the gentlemen playing 
ball below, and the village boys imitating 
Olga and Natale at turning somersaults and 
wheels. 

One afternoon, while the boarders were 
drinking tea under the ash trees, with the 
berries overhead turning red, and the sun 


46 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


streaming across the croquet ground, there 
came a knock at the side door of the board- 
ing-house. Madame Cioche herself opened 
the door, and there stood Natale, smiling 
up into her face, with the old blue hat set 
far back on his dark curls. The lady 
noticed that the boy’s face was very clean. 

“Happy day to you,” he said brightly, 
using the peasant form of address, “and 
my mama says will you please send her a cup 
of tea She is feeling ill to-day.” 

Of course Madame Cioche would send the 
tea, fetching it herself from the dining room 
and handing it to the boy. But she kept 
Natale a moment to ask how it was that his 
mama could possibly like tea. 

“Oh, but she has it every day when we 
are in Egypt,” was the reply. “And to-day 
her head aches. Thank you. Signora.” 
And Natale went off down the hill carrying 
the big cup as carefully as his bowls and 
flasks were always carried. 


THE FESTIVAL OF SAN LORENZO 47 


Mrs. Bishop overheard the word “Egypt” 
and sighed. 

The next day was Sunday and an im- 
portant festival, being the day of San 
Lorenzo. A great harvest of soldi was 
expected, as peasants from all the mountain 
villages would come trooping in that day, 
to go to high mass in the church under the 
old mountain firs, and to take part in the pro- 
cession of the ‘‘ saints ” in the afternoon. So 
there was, of course, to be a performance in 
the tent that day, but in the afternoon this 
time, just after the procession, instead of 
in the evening, when everybody would be 
tired or toiling homeward along the dark 
mountain ways. As there was nothing for 
h im to do about the tent, however, until 
five o’clock should boom from the stone 
tower of the church, Natale made good use 
of his legs during the whole day, for there 
was much to see. 

Betty Bishop had tossed a penny into his 


48 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


hands down over the garden palings that 
very Sunday morning. Perhaps she was 
thinking of some little child at home in 
England who would be clamoring for a 
penny to carry to Sunday school, but 
Natale had no thought of dropping his 
precious two soldi into the priest’s collecting 
bag in the church. 

The 'piazza was too fascinating a place to 
be passed by, when one held a penny of his 
own fast in his fist. With the dogs on each 
side of him, therefore, Natale spent most 
of the day above in the town, going from 
booth to booth, and in fancy spending his 
money over and over again. There were 
sweets of various kinds offered for sale on 
the little tables along the steep, narrow 
streets, and booths of everything from 
coarse stuffs and ready-made clothing to 
breastpins of gay mosaic work and filigree 
rings. 

Everywhere Natale was jostled by the 


THE FESTIVAL OF SAN LORENZO 49 


peasants who all through the morning had 
flocked to the town, dressed in their best 
clothes and wearing holiday looks on their 
faces. The women and girls wore gay 
kerchiefs on their heads, with brilliant 
borderings and flowing ends, while even the 
men wore bits of vivid color in the shape of 
gorgeous neck scarfs spread over their white 
shirt fronts. Mingled with these walked the 
lords and ladies of a higher class dressed 
according to the fashion plates of Paris, and 
seeming to enjoy the hot sunshine and the 
gay restiveness of the multitude as much as 
the plainer folk. All day the frolic and 
prayers and the music of the town band and 
the church organ went on in the little town, 
till mid-afternoon, when there fell a hush 
over all and a great expectation. 

Natale had not a very good place from 
which to see the procession pass, for he 
stood between a very stout peasant woman 
and a visiting priest in his full black gown. 


50 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


Still, he managed to peer from under their 
elbows without attracting their attention, 
and he was content, holding securely in one 
hand, meanwhile, the balloon whistle which 
he had finally purchased with his penny. 
The pretty red bubble of rubber had not 
yet burst, and Natale was happy in its 
possession. The handful of crisp wafers 
flavored with anise seed, which he had 
almost bought — so very foolish he had 
been — would have been eaten long ere 
this, and it would be as if he had never had 
a penny of his own tossed over the fence to 
him by a smiling young lady, but now he 
still had the whistle ! 

On they came, the straggling company 
of men and boys, dressed in white gowns 
and cowls, and bearing huge lighted 
candles in their hands. Natale thought he 
would like to have been one of the two boys 
bearing the immense candlesticks of brass ; 
yet, after all, the candlesticks must be very 


THE FESTIVAL OF SAN LORENZO 51 


heavy, and they were propped very un- 
comfortably on the little boys’ stomachs, 
and very red and perspiring were the little 
boys’ faces. 

Natale thought the men’s feet ugly and 
clumsy, showing below the white gowns, 
and their harsh, chanting voices made him 
shiver. ^ But he could not follow the awk- 
ward marching steps of the peasants with 
laughing looks as some of the onlookers 
were doing, for here, behind the banners and 
crucifixes, came two very curious-looking 
objects. 

''Ecco! the dead saints!” he exclaimed 
softly to himself. '‘How heavy they must 
be in the glass boxes on the men’s shoulders. 
Yet our Antonio Bisbini would never bend 
so under a small box as those men do. 
Ah I but the little girls are pretty, so pretty 
in their white veils, and scattering flowers 
before the saints.” 

The crowd closed in upon the end of the 


52 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


procession now, and Natale could see no 
more, as he was nearly overturned where 
he stood. After a breathless moment or 
two, he found himself left in peace and 
quiet under the great old fir trees in front 
of the church, with the crowd all gone and 
Niero and Bianco with them. 

Nonna had told him to be sure and see 
the saints, if possible, so he went into the 
dark old church and sat down on a low chair 
to wait for the procession to return. He 
knew that San Lorenzo and Sant’ Aurelio 
would surely be brought back to spend the 
night in the church, perhaps in front of the 
candle-lighted altar, and he wished to 
please Nonna. It was dark and quiet in 
his corner under the organ gallery, and it 
was a very easy and natural thing for a tired 
little boy to fall asleep in that quiet place. 

When the procession returned after half 
an hour, it was without the blare of trumpets 
and the crash of organ music, though for a 


THE FESTIVAL OF SAN LORENZO 53 


long while shuffling feet passed in and out. 
This continued until everybody had looked 
at the two saints robed in costly garments 
and reposing now at full length on their 
satin cushions within their caskets of glass 
set before the altar. Many touched the 
rich cloths draping the caskets with rever- 
ent fingers, and pressed kisses on the cold 
glass before passing out into the radiant 
sunset light. 

When Natale waked, the church doors 
were still open, but only one light^swung 
before the high altar, and there was no 
trace anywhere of dead saint or living soul. 
He groped his way among the disarranged 
chairs and benches quite to the altar rail, 
but even the empty biers had been borne 
away to some inner recess of the church, so, 
with a dread that he had overslept awaking 
in his mind, Natale found his way out of 
the church again. 

The purple bloom of evening was creeping 


54 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


up the mountain sides, and a star glowed in 
the sky. Just above the mountain line in 
the west the crescent moon hovered, as if 
uncertain over which side to sink. The 
dread in Natale’s mind had nothing to do 
with saints or dark churches. On awaking, 
his first sensation had been a fear that he 
might have missed the afternoon perform- 
ance in the beloved tent, and now, standing 
outside the church in the dusk, he knew that 
he had missed it ! 

With a sob in his throat he turned his 
face from the telltale sky, and fled through 
the village down to the field. When he 
reached the wagon, — for he would not go 
to the tent, quiet now and unlighted, — the 
first words he heard came from Olga : 

‘‘Have you not heard, Natalino ? Gio- 
vanni has lost a hundred francs ! Some- 
body stole them when he changed his coat 
in the little tent. Yes, I know you were not 
there ! We wondered where you could be ! ” 


CHAPTER V 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 

N ATALE held his breath with horror. 
One hundred francs lost ! And he 
not at hand to hear of it, to help 
look for the money, among the very first ? 
He could not ask Olga how it had hap- 
pened, because his heart was almost too 
disappointed and sore for words. He sat 
down on the wall, with his back toward 
the tent, and waited for her to tell all 
about the loss, although he was not at all 
certain that she would condescend to do 
so. In fact, she said not a word more, 
but stood in front of Natale, wondering 
not a little at his unusual* quiet. 

‘‘You are sulky !” she exclaimed finally. 


56 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


“ and Giovanni is very angry with you. So 
am I, for I had to feel II Duca’s pulse, and 
I did not like it at all. Suppose he had 
kicked me, seeing that it was not you.” 

‘‘II Duca was dead!” Natale retorted, 
with a twinkle in his eye, if only Olga could 
have seen it. “He would not know you 
from me ! ” 

“Dead!” cried Olga. “I believe you 
truly do think that, when you set up your 
crying, Natale; really I did not do it half 
so well as you,” she confessed honestly. 

“But you ‘wheel’ much better than I 
do,” Natale conceded with ready generosity 
in return. 

“II Duca did not shut his eyes at all,” 
Olga went on, nodding assent to Natale’s 
remark, “and I am sure he winked at me, 
Natale, just to frighten me. It did not 
take me long to feel his pulse ! But where 
were you, Natalino, all the time ^ Nonna 
said she was afraid some of the peasants had 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 


57 


stolen you and carried you off, when Niero 
and Bianco came home without you.” 

if they would have let anybody steal 
me ! Olga, I went to sleep in the church, 
waiting for the saints to come back, and 
when I waked it was dark, almost as dark 
as this ! ” 

“Oho ! then you must have been in the 
church when Arduina and I went in to look 
at the saints. Arduina said — but you 
must not dare to tell anybody — she said 
that she did not believe there were any 
bones under the saints’ fine velvet robes 
because San Lorenzo had a hand of pink 
wax, and the rest of him looked rather 
stuffed. But do not tell Nonna, Natale !” 

“Arduina is very wicked,” said Natale, 
but he laughed with Olga, and then felt 
much better, and as if he could ask about 
the losing of the money. 

They were in a little nook to themselves, 
behind the wagon, and no one heeded them. 


58 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


^^Ecco! it was this way,” Olga began, 
charmed to be the first to recount the mis- 
fortune to Natale, who was usually behind 
none in his knowledge of the affairs of the 
company. “Just when Giovanni was go- 
ing in to do the clown in the first dance on 
the rope, the Signor Barbera, the stable 
man, came behind the big tent with his bill 
for keeping the horses, and Giovanni took 
the big pocketbook out of the pocket of 
his coat — ” 

“Yes, I know which pocket,” Natale 
interposed. “I saw him put the money 
there this morning.” 

“Well, the signor could not make the 
change, so he told Giovanni it was all right, 
and any time would do, and then Antonio 
rang the bell for Giovanni, and he just put 
the pocketbook back in his coat and hung 
the coat on the nail in the little tent, and 
hurried on the black coat, and went into the 
ring.” 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 


59 


‘‘Yes, and then?” asked Natale breath- 
lessly. 

“When he came back, he saw his coat on 
the ground, and he knew he had hung it up. 
‘How comes my coat on the ground?’ he 
said, very loud indeed, and your mama told 
him he must have put it there himself. 
But he did not hear her, because he was 
shaking the coat and feeling in the pocket, 
— but there was nothing there ! 

“We made a great fuss about it,” 
Olga ended, shrugging her shoulders and 
throwing up her hands, “but what was 
the use ?” 

Natale was silent with dismay. A hun- 
dred francs meant so much. It was all 
that they had made during the ten days’ 
stay at Cutigliano, and now it was gone, 
in a moment. 

“The stable man?” he questioned in a 
distressed tone of voice, and very low. 

“No, Giovanni said it could not have been 


60 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


the signor. He is a rich man and honest, 
everybody says.” 

So subdued were they all over the trouble 
of the afternoon that not even Elvira 
thought it worth while to scold the quiet 
boy who presently slipped in among the 
little crowd of players in the tent, deep in 
fruitless discussion over their grievous loss. 
They had had a crowded tent that after- 
noon, and the receipts had been so good that 
this evening would have been one of rejoic- 
ing if only the money for the labors of the 
ten other days and nights had been again 
safe in Giovanni’s pocket. There was not 
the slightest clew to the thief, as no stranger 
had been known to enter the tent, and 
Giovanni had even interviewed the Signor 
Barbera from outside the doorway. It had 
been necessary to be on the lookout for 
possible thieving, as the field was crowded 
all the afternoon with strange peasants, 
attracted by the band music and the big 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 


61 


yellow tent, and by peddlers with their 
wares. One very decent-looking peddler 
had begged pretty, vain Arduina to look at 
his beautiful jewelry and ribbons, but she 
had refused him entrance very reluctantly, 
and Giovanni himself had noticed how 
patiently and decorously the man had 
turned away. He had worn a red fez cap 
over his long black hair, and his bushy 
black beard had reached nearly to his waist. 

saw him!” Emilio, one of the mu- 
sicians exclaimed, ‘‘and his legs were as 
crooked as Pietro’s, only they bent out at 
the knee instead of in ! ” There was a laugh 
at this sally, but Pietro frowned and mut- 
tered something about Emilio’s having 
little right to criticize the legs of others. 

“I met such a man as I came out of the 
church in the crowd,” said Nonna, hastening 
to speak that a dispute might be avoided. 
“He walked very well notwithstanding his 
poor, bent legs, and he asked me if he were 


62 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


too late to get a glimpse of the blessed 
relics. A politer man I never saw, though 
Tito was afraid of him, and began to cry 
when the man snapped his fingers at him.” 

Poor Natale felt so left out in the cold 
with this talk that he could not bear it long, 
and was just about to creep away, down to 
his corner in the wagon, when a strange 
hand lifted a corner of the tent fiap, and a 
strange voice inquired for 'piccolo 

Natale 

“Some ladies up at the house there have 
a little present for you all,” the black- 
coated Italian butler of the boarding-house 
announced, peering in upon the group 
gathered about the sputtering lamp inside, 
“but they wish to send it down by the boy, 
Natale.” 

Then Natale was himself again, and with- 
out demur or bashfulness presented himself 
to the servant. 

“It is well you turned up in time, Na- 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 


63 


talino,” said the clown, giving him a little 
shove toward the dignified butler waiting 
just outside. ‘‘Perhaps Olga would not 
have done, in this case. Off with you to the 
forestieri ^ above ! ” 

Many a boy would have been abashed at 
finding himself the center of such a group as 
awaited Natale in the hallway of the house 
in the garden. But Natale was too well 
accustomed to an array of faces fixed upon 
him to make the least show of bashfulness. 
The lady of the house, whose pleasant face 
he knew very well, laid her hand on his 
shoulder and asked him kindly in Italian if 
anything had been heard of the money lost 
that afternoon, and her soft, dark eyes 
looked sympathetically into his own. 

“No, signora, and my papa says we shall 
never see a soldo of it again,” was Natale’s 
prompt answer. 

“Ask him if they have any idea of the 


1 Foreigners. 


64 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


person who stole it,” Betty Bishop suggested 
in English, and Madame Cioche did so. 
Natale’s answer to this was more expressive 
than polite perhaps, for without words he 
simply raised his shoulders as high as 
possible, pressing his elbows against his 
sides, and spreading his hands wide to in- 
dicate the complete ignorance of his people 
as to the coward who had taken their hard- 
earned money. And the drawn-down 
corners of his mouth so changed the ex- 
pression of his face that one would hardly 
have known him. 

“Who would have believed the child 
could make himself so ugly,” Mrs. Bishop 
exclaimed. “Have you no tongue, boy, 
to answer properly.^” 

But as English words were far less in- 
telligible to Natale than Caffero’s whinny, 
or Niero’s bark, he only looked up into 
Madame Cioche’s face and smiled. 

“There! it is a bonny little face after 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 


65 


all/’ said that lady, ‘‘and now shall we give 
him the money and send him away ?” 

“No, let me speak to him first,” de- 
manded Mrs. Bishop, “and you, Mrs. 
Choky, must interpret. Ask him if he likes 
to be a wicked little circus boy.” 

“Aunty !” gasped Betty. 

“Never mind, I have a reason for my 
question, Betty. Hush, what does he 
say 

“Do you like to play in the circus, dear ? ” 
asked Mrs. Cioche’s kind voice, in Italian. 

Natale’s eyes shone. 

“Ah, yes, signora! And when I am a 
man, I shall be another Antonio Bisbini.” 

“He says he likes it very much, Mrs. 
Bishop,” was the interpretation. 

“Already corrupted, poor boy, and so 
young ! ” the old lady sighed, while Betty 
laughed outright. 

“Ask him if he would not like better to 
have some nice clothes, and go to school. 


66 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


and grow up to be a decent man some day, 
Mrs. Choky.” That lady hesitated a little 
before putting this question into Italian. 

“What does she say to me.^” Natale 
asked, his brown eyes twinkling as he looked 
from one to the other, his teeth showing 
white between his red lips. Natale’s was 
a wide, good-natured mouth, very prone to 
laugh upon small provocation. 

“She wants to know if you would not like 
to go to school, and learn to read and write,” 
said Madame Cioche. 

“And leave the circo ? ” Natale asked with 
a gasp. 

“Yes, you could not go to school unless 
you should stop in one place, you know.” 

“And not travel about with the horses 
and wagon any more, and leave Nonna V 

“Of course, Natale. But she is only ask- 
ing you about it, carinOy so do not look so 
troubled.” 

Natale laughed then, and happily. 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 


67 


‘‘ She wanted to find out how much I love 
the circoV^ he exclaimed. ‘‘Please tell her, 
signora. You know, how we all love the 
circo / ” 

“I think I do, Natale. He does not want 
to go to school, Mrs. Bishop,” turning to the 
eager old lady, ‘‘ because he loves his life 
with the circus and his own people too 
much.” 

“And he does not wish to leave his grand- 
mother,” chimed in Betty who had very 
cleverly picked up a good deal of Italian 
during a winter and summer in Italy, and 
all grandmothers are Nonnas in that land. 

Mrs. Bishop was silent for a moment, her 
gaze taking in every detail of Natale’s little 
figure standing sturdily before her, dusty 
shoes, and rough peasant leggings, velveteen 
trousers, faded blue blouse, and rumpled 
curls, with the old hat held in one sun- 
burned hand. His face was not so clean as 
usual now, and there were tired circles about 


68 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


his eyes. It had been a long, exciting sum- 
mer’s day. 

“ Children — especially boys — do not 
know what is best for themselves,” she said 
presently, bending her brows, but not in the 
least frightening Natale, ‘‘ and I am not go- 
ing to give up my plan, for this baby’s 
nonsense. Why, he cannot be over eight 
years old, at the most.” 

“Here, Natale,” said Madame Cioche, 
judging that the interview might well be 
concluded, and handing the boy a small 
packet. “Take this to your papa, and tell 
him that the ladies and gentlemen in my 
house have heard of the loss of the money, 
and are sending him thirty-five francs as 
a little present. Can you carry it safely 

Again Natale’s sweet smile broke over his 
face, but he only nodded happily in reply, 
tucking the money away in the bosom of his 
blouse. 

“Ask him how long they are going to 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 


69 


stay,” Mrs. Bishop called after Madame 
Cioche, who was going to the gate with 
Natale. 

“He says that the sindaco — the mayor 
— has offered them the use of the field for 
another week,” Madame Cioche said, her 
eyes glowing, as she returned to the hall. 
“I am glad of that, as the poor creatures 
will need all they can make here, now.” 

“I call it a sort of punishment, their losing 
the money when playing on Sunday,” Mrs. 
Bishop said severely, and one or two other 
English ladies nodded their approval of this 
speech. “And I think the whole business 
wrong and that it ought to be discouraged. 
I was not at all sure about the propriety of 
giving my francs to your little collection, 
Mrs. Choky.” 

“Would it have been more Christian to 
have let them suffer, perhaps for food, and 
the poor beasts too.^^” the hostess asked, 
pausing on her way through the hall. 


70 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


‘‘But surely you think circusing wrong 
and 2/7ichristian ? ” the disputative old lady 
exclaimed. 

“Aunty, do be quiet,” cried Betty 
warmly. “I am sure you ought not to 
dispute ‘ on Sunday ’ ! Besides,” she added, 
as everybody laughed, and two or three 
softly applauded, “they make their living 
that way, and we cannot change them into 
farmers, or preachers. But I think it is 
always wrong not to help honest people who 
are in trouble.” 

“If they are honest,” Mrs. Bishop re- 
monstrated, but under her breath, this time, 
for Madame Cioche’s eyes were sparkling, 
and she seemed waiting to speak. 

“Those poor creatures down there de- 
serve nothing but praise,” she said stoutly ; 
“they are quiet folks, who teach their chil- 
dren obedience and keep themselves 
remarkably clean and mended. If they 
make their living in a way we do not ap- 


A GIFT FOR THE CIRCUS 


71 


prove, we cannot change them, as Miss 
Betty says, but we can feed them when they 
are hungry, and that seems to me not 
‘unchristian’ !” 

“I am afraid she has a little temper,” 
said Mrs. Bishop, as their hostess went 
up-stairs. 

“A temper I like!” exclaimed a gentle- 
man who had before kept silent, looking up 
from his book. “But do you still think of 
carrying out your plan, Mrs. Bishop ?” 

“If possible, certainly,” was the reply, 
while Betty, shaking her head, walked out 
into the garden. There, under the stars, 
she stood looking down upon the tent in the 
field. There was no wind, and the heavens 
were fair, so the canvas had not been furled. 

“I should like it myself,” she murmured. 
“What a fascinating life to live ! Camping 
out the year round in Italy, with no trouble- 
some dressing four times a day, no tiresome 
table-d’hote dinners at night. But after all 


72 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


I should not like to be that girl, — Arduina, 
they call her. Of course. Aunty is right 
about the rope dancing and other ‘circus- 
ing’ on Sunday, only she need not be quite 
so fussy over what we certainly cannot help. 
Poor Natale ! how disturbed he did look 
when Madame Cioche asked him about 
going to school !” 


CHAPTER VI 

SEPARATION 

ATALE lay flat on the grass, his 



face hidden on his arms, and his 


^ ^ feet rebelliously kicking the ground. 
The added week granted by the mayor 
had passed, and the circus-wagon was 
about to move on. 

"‘You are only to try it, child, and if it 
will not do, you can come back to us. One 
year is not a hundred.” 

No reply from Natale. 

“You ought to think, sometimes, of how 
many mouths your stepfather has to fill,” 
another voice began. “Five children, and 
not one his own.” 

“Why did he marry us then?” fiercely 


74 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


muttered Natale, but without lifting his 
head, so perhaps nobody heard. 

‘‘You will have new clothes and shoes !” 

“And a new hat, Natalino !” 

“And you will learn to read much faster 
than I can teach you ’Lino, with all the 
practicings and the journeyings. Perhaps 
you will even learn to be as clever as my 
Antonio was, before — ” Nonna ended with 
a sigh instead of more words. 

The women and girls were in the side 
tent, busied about dinner, and Nonna 
would not finish her sentence in the pres- 
ence of Antonio’s wife. 

“I would rather be our Antonio than — 
than the King or the principino^ ” ^ Natale 
cried helplessly. Then he sat up on the 
worn grass, and faced them all, tearful but 
resolute. “ I shall not stay here with the 
priest and go to school, mama,” he said 
earnestly. “You shall not leave me be- 

^ Young prince. 


SEPARATION 


75 


hind and take Maria and Pietro and the 
rest.’’ 

“Perhaps we can persuade Giovanni to 
leave little Bianco with you, if the good 
priest does not object,” Nonna whispered 
in his ear. 

“No, I shall go with you,” returned 
Natale. 

“Ah! what is all this.?^” came suddenly 
in Giovanni’s gruff, good-natured tones. 
“What.^ Natale will not stay The beau- 
tiful little star of the ring will not leave us 
in the darkness ? ” And the clown entered 
the tent and flung himself down, laughing, 
beside the little boy. 

“Hurry with the polenta, Arduina,” he 
called to his stepdaughter, who had lifted 
her hot face from the steam of the mush pot 
to laugh at the man’s rough wit. “The 
biggest hole yet torn in the tent must be 
mended this afternoon, and the canvas is 
almost dry now in this wind. If it had not 


76 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


rained yesterday, and if the wind had not 
played us such a trick on the very eve of 
our going, we should have made our for- 
tunes yesterday. A cattle fair does not 
offer itself every day, with its crowd of 
country bumpkins who never saw a man 
in tights. Now, that will do, Natale,” 
turning to the boy, who was sniffing 
audibly. “Hours ago it was all decided, 
and there is nothing more to be said.” 

“Then I am not to stay in this horrid 
place, Giovanni — papa — ” 

‘ Giovanni — papa — ! ’ No more of 
these tears, Natalino. You are to stay in 
this beautiful place, and after polenta, you 
are to go up to the garden and thank the 
lady.” 

With a loud, rebellious howl, Natale 
sprang to his feet and rushed out into the 
open air. Nor did he stop until he stood 
among the briar bushes below the garden 
palings. Clenching his small grimy fists, he 


SEPARATION 


77 


stood there looking up toward the many- 
windowed 'pension and shook them vehe- 
mently, while his shrill voice cried out 
passionately : 

“I shall not stay here ! I shall not go to 
school ! I like my old hat, and I want 
Nonna to teach me to read. I shall never 
thank you, never, never, NEVER ! ” 

He had seen no one in the garden, and 
was only addressing the whole houseful of 
his enemies up there in the big yellow build- 
ing with the staring windows. Why should 
they interfere with him ? Why should 
any one be trying to make him wretched, — 
the most wretched boy in all Italy ? 

"‘Heyday! what’s all this about?” and 
a white-haired old man, speaking from the 
garden, came close to the palings and looked 
over at the small, threatening figure among 
the bushes. “I cannot understand your 
gibberish, if you are talking to me. You 
would better go away now, little boy, or 


78 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


some of your people will come and whip 
you.” 

“How suddenly you stopped the noise, 
Mr. Grantly,” exclaimed Betty, coming up 
to his side. “Who was it.? Why, Aunty’s 
little protege, Natale ! How pitiful he 
looks, walking away as if his feelings were 
hurt. You must have frightened him.” 

“Not a bit of it, ma’am. He frightened 
me with his fierce little voice. It came 
suddenly, just as I was dropping off to 
sleep in my chair. It is a relief to have 
them moving on this afternoon, with their 
horns and drum. But that boy stays, 
some one tells me. Is it possible that the 
family agreed to give him up? I have 
understood that the Italians cling to each 
other as much as even we do in America 
or England. Do they really leave the 
child?” 

“For more money than he could ever 
bring them by his somersaulting, yes,” 


SEPARATION 


79 


Betty answered. “Sometimes I think 
Aunty really does not know what to do 
with her money,” the girl went on con- 
fidentially to the old gentleman, who was 
listening with interest. “Now, that boy 
has no desire to be taken away from ‘the 
evil life he is leading’ in Aunty’s estimation, 
and he does not wish to be se^n!t to school 
and become ‘a decent man.’” 

“Ah ! tell me the whole plan, now. I 
heard something of it a few days ago.” 

“ It is very simple — all but getting Natale 
to agree to being imposed upon,” Betty went 
on a little vexedly. “Aunty has had the 
stepfather and the mother up here several 
times this past week to be talked to, and 
an old woman who seems to be the grand- 
mother of them all. Miss Lorini has done 
all the interpreting, and also saw the priest 
about it, as Madame Cioche would not. 
They have agreed to leave Natale here for 
one year ; he is to be taken care of by the 


80 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


priest’s mother, and to be sent to school and 
made decent,’ poor little fellow.” 

Mr. Grantly laughed, but said nothing, for 
his heart was still young and understanding 
of boyish hearts, if his head was white, and 
he felt a wise interest in Mrs. Bishop’s 
philanthropic scheme. 

“Aunty is to pay everything, and she 
says she thinks she knows now why all the 
hotels up at Abetone were full so she could 
not get, a good room there for these three 
weeks. She finds that she was ^ordained’ 
to rescue a boy from his persecutors, as she 
persists in calling the circus men. It is 
supposed, I believe, that all little boys and 
girls of circuses have been stolen from kind 
parents, and if not are half-killed with 
cruelty by their own.” 

“You speak very warmly, young lady,” 
Mr. Grantly remarked, a little reproof in his 
tone. “There is no doubt that many such 
children do suffer and are very unhappy,” 


SEPARATION 


81 


‘‘Those certainly do not ! ” retorted Betty, 
pointing to a number of the circus children 
frolicking in the field with Niero and Bianco. 
Olga’s red cotton dress was flitting over the 
grass, and her merry laugh was echoed by 
the other little ones, as Niero finally caught 
her red skirts in the chase. 

“Of course the clown objected at first,” 
Betty continued, “but Aunty was more 
determined than he ajid soon proved to 
him that it would be worth his while to 
agree. The old lady, whom they call 
Nonna, was curiously anxious for Natale 
to have a chance at schooling. I won- 
dered at that till I heard about her son.” 

“Yes, I know,” Mr. Grantly assented. 
“Some, however, would think he had made 
a very fair exchange in giving up the future 
of a priest for the easy, out-of-doors life of 
an acrobat. There is no accounting for tastes, 
though. And is this boy to bemade apriest ? ” 
“ Only let my Aunty hear you say that !” 


82 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


laughed the girl. "‘No, indeed, but the 
priest was the only one who would agree to 
be troubled with the child, after Miss Lorini 
had explained all Aunty’s conditions — how 
Natale was to have a cold bath every morn- 
ing, meat to eat every day, and new shoes 
as soon as his old ones come into holes. 
The priest, too, has agreed to write a letter 
to Aunty every month to tell her of Natale’s 
progress — ” 

“Toward growing into a "decent man’ ” ? 
interposed Mr. Grantly. ""Well, I hope the 
plan will work well for all parties. Few 
Italian peasant lads get such a chance.” 
Then the old gentleman went back to his 
chair to continue his nap. 

All that afternoon, until four o’clock, 
there was an unusual bustle going on about 
the little encampment. The tattered, 
damp, half -ruined canvas was rolled up and 
packed along with poles and planks and 
ropes on a small cart hired for this oc- 


SEPARATION 


83 


casion, while the cooking utensils and the 
scant furniture of the tents were gathered 
together for conveyance in the house-wagon. 
It was a cold and dreary day, following the 
night of stormy wind, with the clouds set- 
tling close about the mountain tops and the 
wind sweeping down the valley wet with 
rain. And in the heart of Natale there 
was even less promise of sunshine. He sat 
apart from the others on the damp wall, 
frowning and sullen. 

Half an hour before, he had been almost 
forcibly dragged up the hill to the house in 
the garden by Giovanni, who had made 
little jokes to hide the sulkiness of the boy’s 
replies to the questions of the ladies gathered 
there. Madame Cioche had promptly hid- 
den herself when she saw the green gate 
open and the pair coming in, but the clown 
had walked directly through the hall and up 
to the little table where Mrs. Bishop sat 
taking her tea. 


84 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


No command of Giovanni nor persuasion 
of Miss Lorini, who was an artist, could 
induce Natale to say: ‘‘Thank you, sig- 
nora, for your kindness.” His revolt had 
been beforehand hushed into silence by 
some very plain threats of punishment by 
his mother, but nothing could make him 
say that he was glad to stay in Cutigliano 
and go to school every day. 

He stood before them all, miserable as a 
child could be, his face very clean and pale, 
and a new pair of shoes already upon his 
feet. They pinched his toes woefully, but 
his heart ached more than his feet. 

“You will love the signora very much, 
some day, when you are a man and remem- 
ber how good she was to the poor little boy 
who knew nothing but how to turn somer- 
saults,” Miss Lorini had said caressingly in 
her softest Italian, studying the piteous 
face meanwhile with an eye to painting it 
some day, when it should smile again. 


SEPARATION 


85 


“I shall learn to do something besides the 
capitomboli,^ when I am a man,” Natalehad 
said eagerly. “I shall be like our Antonio 
some day.” Perhaps these foreigners would 
be willing to leave him in peace if he could 
convince them that he wished to be a stroll- 
ing player all his life. 

‘‘He speaks as if he does not exactly 
understand,” said Miss Lorini, looking at 
Giovanni inquiringly. ‘‘Does he not know 
that he is to give up the circus now 

Giovanni shrugged his shoulders, then 
shook Natale’s slender shoulder, muttering : 

“No more of your silly talk, boy!” 
Then louder, “If you will not thank the 
lady, I do, with all my heart.” And with 
that he bowed low, then pushing Natale 
before him, went quickly away. He was, 
in secret, rather sorry for the boy, who had 
never before given any trouble with foolish 
willfulness, and who had moreover such high 


Somersaults. 


86 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


ambitions ! It did seem a stupid life to 
which they were leaving the poor child, but 
then there was to be considered the roll of 
money already sewed into his own belt, 
with more to accumulate there, if Natale 
should be left still another year with the 
priest Luigi. If rich forestieri had nothing 
else to do with their money but give it 
away in this frantic fashion, the stepfather 
was not unwilling to share the bounty, and 
Elvira, the mother, had seemed not to mind. 

So now Natale sat alone on the wall, feel- 
ing very much out of it all, and longing to 
hear some one say, “Natalino, do fetch me 
this”, or ‘‘Carry that”; but no one said 
anything of the kind. They seemed to feel 
that he was no longer one of them, and his 
little heart swelled to breaking. 

He was too young to long harbor ill-will 
and of too sunny a spirit to sulk for many 
minutes at a time, so presently he slipped 
oflF the wall and ran to meet Olga, who was 


SEPARATION 


87 


struggling over to the traveling house-on- 
wheels, dragging two stools behind her. 
The very last things were being done, and 
already the horses were standing by, ready 
to be hitched at the last moment. 

‘‘Do let me carry the stools, Olga,” 
Natale pleaded with unwonted entreaty 
in his voice. “Well, one of them, then.” 

“I am sorry you are going to stay behind 
here, Natalino,” the little girl panted. 
“Why do you.^ I should run after the 
wagon if I were you ! ” 

Natale had never thought of such a 
simple thing to do by way of escape ! He 
promptly set down the stool he had grasped 
and looked fixedly away from Olga’s red- 
brown eyes. 

Alas ! in that critical moment, what did 
he see approaching from the village ? The 
fiat, broad-brimmed hat and fiowing black 
skirts of a priest, descending the street and 
turning in at the field ! 


88 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


There was then not a moment to be lost ! 
Forgetting Olga and the heavy stools, 
Natale turned and fled, away — anywhere 
— out of sight of the jailor advancing. 
Everything flashed out of his mind except 
the impulse to escape, to hide himself from 
those searching eyes under the felt hat brim. 
His flying feet skimmed across the field, and 
when they had borne him out of sight down 
the nearest slope, Natale flung himself 
on the ground under a thicket of thorny 
blackberry bushes. 

He lay there for what must have been a 
long time, for, after a while, a sudden 
shower of rain swept down the valley and 
for a few minutes enveloped everything 
in a gray mist. Even after it had passed, 
Natale delayed returning to the wagon 
until the priest should have quite gone, 
in despair of capturing his prisoner. When 
at last he did venture forth, and crept 
to the upper verge of the slope, his first 


SEPARATION 


89 


glance was across the field for the brown 
wagon. 

It was not there ! 

He set out in a headlong run for the place 
where it had stood. There was nothing 
left — absolutely nothing. Only a priest 
sat quietly waiting in a gap in the wall. 

Natale, with eyes only for the deserted 
spot, came stumbling upon the man, with- 
out so much as seeing that he was there, 
and then the priest rose, and taking the 
boy’s hand, spoke with the utmost quiet- 
ness. 

‘‘Come home with me now, Natalino,” 
was what he said, and Natale heard as one 
hears dream voices. 

Poor child ! If he had only listened, he 
might have heard the dull screeching of the 
brakes as the wagon crawled carefully down 
the hill toward the arched bridge, and it 
would have been an easy matter to snatch 
his hand from the limp grasp of the priest 


90 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


and go hurrying down the short cuts in 
pursuit. But his head seemed so full of 
a hundred roaring noises that he could not 
hear, and his heart beat so fast that he 
could not speak, and so up the hill he went 
at the priest’s side. 

Nor did he see the quiet smile upon 
Luigi’s shaven lips, as they passed the green 
gate of the garden where Betty stood peering 
through. She would not have spoken to the 
boy just then for all the world, and as for 
Madame Cioche, she could not have done 
so if she had wished. She gazed down from 
her latticed window, her bright eyes dimmed 
as they fell upon the little caged bird of the 
fields fluttering by. 


CHAPTER VII 


THE CAGED BIRD OF THE FIELDS 

T here is a short, crooked street in 
Cutigliano, which leads back of the 
church and out upon the promenade 
of San Vito. This street is confined on 
either hand by stone houses and stone walls 
of gardens, and paved with large square 
stones. Here and there a gateway gives a 
peep at lapping hills across the river. The 
massive church tower rises directly from a 
narrow turn in this street, and when the 
bells ring down from the arches in the top 
of this tower, the stony street reverberates 
with a deafening clamor. 

By the time the priest and Natale reached 
the foot of the church tower, the boy was 
weeping bitterly but quietly. His one free 


92 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


arm hid as much of his face as possible, 
and his feet in the clumsy new shoes stum- 
bled so helplessly that Luigi had some 
trouble in preventing his falling. 

As they had passed through the town, 
where everybody sat at their doors or 
lounged in the piazza, all had recognized 
the little acrobat, as Natale realized only 
too well. Many accosted him in wonder, 
and some would even have stopped him to 
inquire into his misfortune in being left 
behind by his family. But the young 
priest motioned such away with authority, 
silencing with a gesture of his long finger the 
too curious. Others had already learned 
how it had come about that Natale was to 
spend a year with Sora Grazia, and her son 
the priest, and these contented themselves 
with shrugs and smiles for the boy’s com- 
panion, as who should say : “We wish you 
well of your bargain. Signor priest.” 

The great hands of the church clock 


THE CAGED BIRD OF THE FIELDS 93 


pointed to ten minutes of four, as the bell 
boomed the hour of six. No one, however, 
ever thought of consulting the huge figures 
painted on the stone face of the tower 
clock, for those long iron hands had not 
stirred for many a day. 

The deep sound of the bell struck so 
suddenly upon Natale’s ears that he started, 
and dropping his arm from before his eyes, 
gazed dully ahead. It was not often that 
he had strayed farther than this corner of the 
old church, and he had never followed the 
San Vito promenade to the end. Most of 
the town was left behind now ; whither 
could this man be taking him ? 

A row of houses with numbers in blue 
figures on one side of the lintels extended 
back of the church, but before none of 
these did Luigi pause. Next came a low, 
broken wall, and then a house, detached 
from its neighbors and with a long, sloping 
roof, covered with slabs of slate. This 


94 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


house had no door opening on the street, 
and in the blank front wall there was only 
a very small window at one corner close 
under the eaves. Over a door in the end of 
the house nearest the church there was a 
small crucifix in carved stone set into the 
wall, but this door was seemingly closed 
and unused. 

The priest led Natale a few steps farther, 
to the other end of the house, and then they 
left the street and entered a long balcony 
leading to a wide-open door. 

A middle-aged woman sat just inside this 
doorway at the foot of a flight of stairs 
leading up into the room under the roof. 
She wore a kerchief of red and black cotton 
over her head and tied in a knot under her 
chin, and her eyes were bent upon a coarse 
piece of mending occupying her work-worn 
hands. 

At Luigi’s heavy step on the stone flooring 
of the balcony, she lifted her face to his and 



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THE CAGED BIRD OF THE FIELDS 95 


something like a smile softened the expres- 
sion of her stern features. Her black brows 
unbent and she made way for her son to 
enter by twisting her stool slightly and 
shifting her feet. Luigi passed by her and 
took up his stand in the gathering gloom of 
the little passage, his eyes fixed warily upon 
Natale. The little boy had released his 
hand from the priest’s outside the door, 
and now stood leaning against the railing 
of the balcony, staring frowningly at the 
woman. 

‘"You are content to have it over with, 
Gigi?” the mother asked, glancing from 
man to boy and back again. 

Luigi nodded his head. 

“ Give him something to eat and put him 
to bed,” he counseled in a low tone, “and 
do not a^gue with him to-night. To- 
morrow the sun will shine and he will begin 
to forget.” 

Natale’s sharp ears caught every word. 


96 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


stolid as he looked. ‘‘Forget ? ” What did 
they think he would forget.^ Not Olga’s 
last words, certainly: “I would run after 
the wagon, if I were you.” 

But, why was he not running now? No 
door, as yet, kept him prisoner. There was 
the empty street. Below ran the long, 
long white road. The night was coming 
down, and he was not afraid of the dark. 
Once out of sight, around one of the loops 
of the road, it would take but a moment to 
slip off the heavy shoes with their soles half 
an inch thick, and then on and on in the 
cool darkness he might run on light bare 
feet — “after the wagon.” 

He thrilled with the thought as it flashed 
through his mind, but a flash of the same 
thought thrilled Sora Grazia at the same 
time, for just then she leaned forward and 
laying her hand on Natale’s arm, she drew 
him to her side. 

“Once I had a curly-haired little boy of 


THE CAGED BIRD OF THE FIELDS 97 


my own/’ she said with a serious smile, 
‘‘but after a while, he grew to be a man, and 
now he has brought to me another little 
boy. Natalino, I hope you will be as good 
a boy as my Gigi ever was.” 

Natale gazed earnestly into the woman’s 
face. 

“I am not at all good, signora,” he said 
unsteadily, and he could not help the stir- 
ring of hope in his heart, with this confes- 
sion, but Sora Grazia only smiled again and 
tapped his cheek, and said that perhaps the 
good Luigi would teach him to be good. 

And there was no more opportunity left 
Natale for running away, for he was pres- 
ently led into the kitchen where he had to 
sit and watch Sora Grazia prepare the 
macaroni for supper. He was hungry 
enough to enjoy a plateful of this but the 
slip of boiled beef served him on a clean 
plate afterward could not be choked down. 
He had overheard some one in the tent — 


98 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


could it have been only that very day ? — 
say that he was to have meat every day in 
his new home, and his sister, Arduina, had 
added that she wished she were sure of 
getting a morsel three times a week. Had 
not a doctor in Sicily said that she must 
have all delicate and nourishing food ^ And 
what were dry bread and sour wine as sub- 
stitutes.^ No, Natale could not eat the 
meat that night. Happily the plate of 
macaroni had been generous, and what in 
all the land of sunny Italy is so filling as a 
plate of macaroni ? 

The valley looked dismally dark that 
night, as Natale crept from his little trestle 
bed and crouched on the brick fioor at the 
window, after he was supposed to be asleep. 
He was to share the priest’s attic chamber, 
and a few moments before Sora Grazia had 
carried away the candle. He peered out 
between the flower pots on the window 
ledge and again wondered in his childish 


THE CAGED BIRD OF THE FIELDS 99 


way why anybody in the big world outside 
should have troubled to make him miserable. 

He was very sure that he had done 
nothing to harm the foreign lady with the 
spectacles. Once he had laughed when 
she had sneezed many times very loudly, 
in crossing the field near him, but he was 
sure no one had heard him, for he was lying 
on the ground and had buried his face in the 
grass. The pretty signorina with her had 
laughed too, and said something in their 
strange language which the lady had an- 
swered by another loud sneeze. Besides this, 
there was absolutely nothing he could have 
done to provoke any of the people in the 
garden. Yet, here he was being punished ! 

The thought of Sora Grazia oppressed 
him, her serious face and her high hopes of 
his goodness. The house, too, was quieter 
than any place he had ever known, — he 
who had been used to few roofs save those 
of the caravan and tent. There were no 


100 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


children about, and there was no sound 
inside of crying, or laughing, or singing, or 
whistling. It was almost as bad as having 
to live in a solemn church when the candles 
are all out and the crowds are gone, and 
one feels, in the dimness and silence, as if 
something were coming up stealthily behind 
one to scare one’s wits away. It is all very 
well to rest for a minute in a cool church, 
out of the glare of the sunlight, when one 
may run out again at will, free as a wild bird 
or butterfly. But to have to stay, night 
and day, for a whole year in such a place ! 
Natale shuddered, for this was just the way 
in which the awful quiet of the little stone 
house of the priest affected him. 

When Luigi came up to bed, hours later, 
he lifted the sleeping boy from the bricks 
at the window and covered him up snugly 
in bed. 

“My mother thinks we can do it,” he 
muttered to himself, as he threw off his 


THE CAGED BIRD OF THE FIELDS 101 


black gown. ‘‘I shall do my part, but I am 
not sure they have done a wise thing.” 
Then he sighed a little. Perhaps he was 
wishing that he could be a little boy again, 
with the wide, wide world before him, and 
no one to interfere with his choice of a ca- 
reer, — free to be acrobat or priest, but al- 
ways to have his own choice. 

With the passing of the first night all idea 
of running away seemed to have left Natale’s 
mind, and Sora Grazia was at first de- 
lighted to find her charge as submissive as 
a lamb to all her arrangements. After the 
first day or two, however, it became not 
quite so comfortable to see the little boy 
sit immovable for hours at a time, on the 
fioor of the balcony, gazing down into the 
valley where the river ran merrily over the 
rocks. She would even have preferred to 
rebuke the child for something a little more 
outrageous than his listless torpor. She 
herself had to eat the meat prepared for 


102 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


Natale, if she would not see it wasted, for 
Natale could not touch it, nor would Luigi, 
her usually tractable son. 

The young priest was no less puzzled over 
Natale’s conduct than his mother was. 
The schoolmaster reported to him that the 
boy held his little paper-covered spelling- 
book before his eyes with the utmost dili- 
gence, and really seemed to try to remember 
the letters as they were pointed out to him 
with patient repetition, but that he might 
as well have been gazing off into the valley 
instead, for all the good the pages did him, 
and Luigi believed it. 

The other boys tried to lure him into their 
games and to practice his funny capitomboli 
but he would only sit quietly by, on the 
stone steps of the church, watching them 
till playtime was over, when he must sit up 
on the bench in the schoolroom again and 
hold his book before his eyes. 

‘‘He cannot keep up his sulking forever,” 


THE CAGED BIRD OF THE FIELDS 103 


Sora Grazia said on the sixth day of Natale’s 
stay with her. Luigi was standing near her 
in the balcony, brushing the dust from the 
skirts of his long gown, which he shook 
vigorously with his strong hands, as his 
mother continued, “I confess that I am 
surprised he has taken things so quietly.” 

‘‘A little too quietly!” muttered Luigi 
into the folds of his gown. 

‘‘But now, one would like to see him 
brighten up a little instead of glooming 
over his food and everything else,” Sora 
Grazia went on. “He is not the same child 
he was a week ago, making his ridiculous 
capitomboli over the circus carpet. I won- 
der if he could turn a somersault now, 
Luigi.” The woman lifted her head from 
her work to look over at Natale, who sat 
on the low street wall with his feet dangling 
into the road. 

“I gave him leave to go and play with 
the boys down in the field, this afternoon,” 


104 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


said Luigi, shaking his gown almost 
viciously. ‘‘He said he did not wish to go 
where his tent had been, and that he never 
expected to turn a somersault again.” 

“Impertinent!” exclaimed Sora Grazia. 
“We’ll let him alone a while longer, and 
he’ll come all right. A child cannot sulk 
forever, as I said before.” 

“But one can die of starvation and home- 
sickness, perhaps,” quoth Luigi, stepping 
past his mother and springing up the stairs, 
his gown upon his arm. 

Grazia’s retort was stayed upon her lips 
by what she now saw passing in the street. 


CHAPTER VIII 

THE CAGE DOOR OPENED 

N ATALE, too, was looking up, but 
only dully, as a party of ladies and 
gentlemen sauntered toward him 
laughing and talking gayly as they came. 
Many such groups had passed him already, 
taking afternoon strolls toward the beautiful 
promenade of San Vito leading around the 
mountain side. But this particular group 
paused, when a spectacled old lady did, and 
all gathered about Natale, except the white- 
haired gentleman standing a little aloof 
and tapping the paving stones with his 
stick. 

“Why haven’t you been to see us, Natale 
Marzuchetti Miss Lorini asked cheer- 


106 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


fully in Italian. "‘Mrs. Bishop was sure 
you would come.” 

“He does not look like the same child !” 
whispered Betty to her aunt, who now 
pushed forward. 

“Ask him if he is a smart boy in school, 
and if he is not glad to be dressed so de- 
cently and to be learning something use- 
ful, Mrs. Bishop said hurriedly to the 
Italian lady, all of which was repeated to 
Natale in his own language as was re- 
quested. But Natale only shook his head 
slowly and wistfully. 

“You used to talk fast enough!” Mrs. 
Bishop cried impatiently. “Look,” she 
went on, pointing to the next house, a little 
farther on, “don’t you see that white stone 
in the wall ? The words on it tell about a 
man who was born there, two hundred and 
fifty years ago, who was so good and useful 
that the people here put his name up there 
that he might never be forgotten. What’s 


THE CAGE DOOR OPENED 


107 


to hinder there being a stone put up on this 
house, to tell about little Natale who was 
only a poor circus boy, but who came to 
live here when he was eight years old and 
became a very useful and good man ? Tell 
him. Miss Lorini, just what I say!” And 
Mrs. Bishop pointed from the memorial 
tablet in one house to the blank front wall 
of the other, while Luigi, peering out of his 
window between the flower pots, dodged 
behind a tall geranium, and hoped the sharp 
eyes of the old lady were not searching for 
him. 

Natale listened gravely to Miss Lorini’s 
communication, his eyes passing carelessly 
from the memorial tablet to the wall of an 
opposite house. 

There was a rude painting on this wall of 
a Madonna holding a baby in her arms, and 
it was protected from the weather by a 
shallow arch of masonry. As Natale looked 
at the picture, he was . reminded in some 


108 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


mysterious way of Nonna, who was never 
without a child in her arms, unless she were 
bending over a fountain washing the chil- 
dren’s clothes. A new look sprang into 
his eyes. 

“Our Antonio had his name printed in 
Egypt and in Turkey and in Greece!” he 
answered proudly, for the first time opening 
his lips. “I would rather be like that than 
have my name cut here on the priest’s 
house !” 

“Good for the little chap,” cried the 
gentleman softly. He had understood what 
the shrill little voice said. 

“Printed on what, child? What was 
‘our Antonio’s’ name printed on, in all 
those places?” Miss Lorini asked. 

“On paper, of course,” answered the child 
simply. “And there were pictures of him 
too, all red and yellow and blue, performing 
on the bars. Everybody in the streets 
was looking at his name and the pictures.” 


THE CAGE DOOR OPENED 


109 


The little fellow’s face was glowing as he 
spoke of his friend, and Miss Lorini had not 
the heart to translate his words to Mrs. 
Bishop, who could hardly have passed them 
by calmly. 

“But you are content here?” Betty 
managed to ask in intelligible Italian. 

The shadow fell again over Natale’s face, 
and his figure visibly drooped. He did 
not pretend to answer her question. 

“Oh, Aunty, let him go back to his 
people,” Betty pleaded, seeing the change. 
“Anybody can see that he is miserable. 
He is too little to be made to suffer.” 

“He is too little to suffer long,” Mrs. 
Bishop replied calmly, with but one thought 
in her mind, of course. 

“Poor little Egyptian ! ” sighed the gentle- 
man. “He was born in Egypt, was he not. 
Miss Betty ?” 

“At Port Said, yes, and Pietro in Tunis 
they say.” 


no 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


‘‘Well, be a good boy, Natale,” said Mrs. 
Bishop, patting his head, in its new cap. 
“Then you will be happy. In a few days, 
I shall send for you to come to see me, and 
we will drink tea in the garden. Good-by ! 
Addior 

Natale touched his hat, as he had long 
ago been taught to do, and the pedestrians 
moved away, all but the gentleman who 
had called him a “little Egyptian.” 

He stood for a moment at Natale’s side, 
with his back turned to the house and his 
departing friends, and in a trice a handful 
of copper coins was transferred from his 
pocket to Natale’s hands. Mr. Grantly 
had just had a paper note changed into small 
coins, at the fruit shop, and he was glad to 
relieve his pocket of some of its weight. 

“I hope his guardians will let him keep 
the money,” was his thought as he turned 
away from Natale’s brilliant smile of thanks. 
The boy’s training had made him none too 


THE CAGE DOOR OPENED 


111 


proud to accept the money of a stranger, 
and he lost no time in stowing it away in 
his jacket pocket, while Mr. Grantly hur- 
ried after the echoing steps of his party. 

Luigi at the window above had seen the 
money given to Natale, but he asked no 
questions of the boy, who, after kicking his 
heels against the wall for some time longer, 
was presently called to his supper. 

There was a flush on Natale ’s cheeks and 
a brightness in his eyes which even Sora 
Grazia noticed, and as the evening was cool, 
she thought it wise to forbid his sitting 
out on the balcony or the wall, as was his 
wont, until bedtime. He looked feverish, 
she said, and in her own mind she planned 
a cup of hot camomile tea as a remedy at 
bedtime. Natale ’s disappointment at this 
command to keep indoors showed so plainly 
upon his childish features that Sora Grazia 
was provoked, and for the first time since the 
boy had been with her she used harsh tones. 


112 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


‘‘There ! you may as well go to bed at 
once!” she cried, as he was leaving the 
kitchen, without a word it is true, but with 
the light all gone from his face. “I can 
never please you, whatever I do, and you 
are here only to waste food and sulk. Go 
to bed, Natale !” 

Luigi had gone ofiF directly after eating his 
supper, about some matter of business with 
one of his superiors at the church, so he was 
not there to take Natale’s part. 

It is hard enough to be sent to bed on an 
ordinary night and at one’s regular time, as 
any child will agree, but to be forbidden the 
early hours of a moonlit evening outdoors, 
especially when one’s little head is teeming 
with wild, delicious ideas of flight — away 
from daily baths, from the cramping walls 
of a house, and out into the freshness and 
freedom of the night, which has no terror 
for the dwellers in tents, was well-nigh 
unbearable. 


THE CAGE DOOR OPENED 


113 


Ah ! how little Sora Grazia knew of the 
anguish she was causing ! 

But Natale obediently stumbled slowly 
upstairs in the dark to the bedroom, and 
when there, crouched in his usual place on 
the floor behind the flower pots without an 
audible murmur. 

The little acrobat had made no plans at 
all, but with the touch of the money given 
him by the kind old gentleman on San Vito, 
an impulse to seek his freedom had occurred 
to his mind, and in the half-hour while he 
continued on the wall, furtively handling 
the coins in his pocket, he had wished, — 
only wished, however, — that he might 
have the courage to steal out into the moon- 
light, after eating, while Sora Grazia should 
be about her dish-washing, and Luigi poring 
over one of his little black books, perhaps, by 
the light of the candle in the kitchen. He 
had often thought of Olga’s words, ‘T would 
run after the wagon, if I were you,” but he 


114 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


had been too closely watched during the 
first day or two to admit of his carrying out 
so bold a plan, and since then, for the rest of 
the long, dreary week since the caravan had 
gone, he had not had the spirit to undertake 
such a measure. The whole world seemed 
to intervene between himself and the be- 
loved company who had gone, and he felt 
sure that he would be seen by some mistaken 
person and brought back, even before he 
could reach the river, if he should attempt 
to follow. 

Until to-night no thought of leaving under 
the protection of the friendly darkness had 
come to him, and he had only been able to 
see himself flying down the sunny road in 
full view of all the village, to be promptly 
turned back again by some carriage driver 
of the place, or some schoolboy bigger than 
himself and therefore stronger. Besides, 
he had had no money, and Natale had 
traveled enough to know that a few cents 


THE CAGE DOOR OPENED 


115 


in one’s pocket make one’s road easier and 
less long. So the days had passed, and 
Natale was fast drifting into a state of list- 
less torpor which must have ended in illness, 
had not Mr. Grantly changed a five-franc 
note at the fruit shop that sunny afternoon 
and taken a stroll along San Vito where 
Natale sat ‘^sulking” on the wall ! 

Presently, as the little child continued to 
gaze longingly out into the moonlight, a ray 
of further hope illumined his mind. As 
Luigi had gone to the church now, it would 
be late before he would return. Sora 
Grazia always sat dozing on her stool in the 
doorway until time for barring the door and 
going to bed. Why should he not slip past 
her and away into the shadows of the street, 
before Luigi should return ? His heart 
leaped at the thought, and he rose noise- 
lessly to his feet and glanced around the 
darkening room. His small cot stood 
smooth and white against the wall. An- 


116 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


other thought struck him, and he quailed 
with a sense of utter discouragement. 
When Luigi should come in, — and he 
might be very early, one never knew, — the 
runaway would be missed straightway from 
the empty little bed, and easily overtaken 
if he should have taken the regular road 
down the hill. 

It is true there were paths innumerable 
down the terraces from the back of almost 
any house in the street, most of them 
probably leading down to the river far 
below, but Nat ale had been no explorer of 
the neighborhood during his week of cap- 
tivity, and was ignorant of the precipitate 
windings and the final ending of even the 
most practicable of these. No, he must go 
by the road, and he must wait until Luigi 
should return, and get to bed and to sleep. 

Natale knew that the priest slept soundly, 
for, one night he had had the misfortune to 
knock over upon the floor a pot containing 


THE CAGE DOOR OPENED 


117 


a carnation plant, and the crash had not 
awakened Luigi. The boy had waked and 
had gone to the window to peer out into the 
night, fancying that he heard the hoarse 
creaking of the caravan brake as the clumsy 
vehicle crawled down the hill, and in craning 
his head between the pots, his elbow had 
pushed over one of them. Fortunately, 
neither pot nor plant had broken, and he 
had spent a good deal of time in packing the 
loosened earth about the carnation’s roots 
and replacing the pot among its fellows. 
The next morning, Sora Grazia had bidden 
him be more careful about carrying mud 
upstairs on his shoes, only to be cleaned up 
by her afterward, and he supposed he must 
have left some of the earth upon the floor, 
in the dim light. 

At any rate, Luigi slept soundly, and if 
he, himself, could only manage to keep 
awake until all was safe, he knew that he 
would have no diflSculty in unbarring the 


118 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


door. He had accomplished it unaided 
only that morning, with Sora Grazia stand- 
ing by and saying that it was the first thing 
of use he had set his hands to do since com- 
ing there to live. She had spoken good- 
naturedly though, and Natale had nothing 
against her. No, not even now did he 
remember her late harsh words, for he was 
too sweet-natured to harbor malice. He had 
only suffered, and now there was a prospect 
of escaping more suffering of the same kind. 

So after sitting on his bed with a wild 
turmoil of thoughts engaging his busy little 
brain, he began rapidly to undress. Luigi 
must not find him up ! But, after taking 
off the strong new suit of clothes which 
Mrs. Bishop had had made for him, he 
rummaged under his mattress where his 
old things had been stored by Sora Grazia 
and quickly got into the worn trousers, the 
faded blouse and leggings, tucking the old 
shoes under his pillow. He had set the new 


THE CAGE DOOR OPENED 


119 


shoes and stockings in orderly fashion on the 
floor and folded up the new clothes and laid 
them at the foot of the little cot. How 
fortunate that his old shoes had not been 
thrown away, for he could hardly have 
traveled barefoot over the flinty stones of 
the road and the river. Natale chose to 
wear the old easy shoes, for the new ones 
had always hurt him, and he would not have 
been able to steal unheard out of the house 
with those heavy, creaking soles tramping 
over the bricks. If he had known of the 
long way ahead of the old worn shoes, per- 
haps he would have planned to carry the 
despised footgear in his hands. But fore- 
thought had little place in the mind of so 
young a runaway, and he was guided in his 
change of clothes only by his own desires for 
comfort. The old clothes were as familiar as 
old friends, and therefore he preferred them. 

Then, after making his preparations, not 
forgetting to change the money from the 


120 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


pocket of the new jacket to that of his old 
trousers, he laid himself down on the cot, 
and drew up the light covering snugly about 
his shoulders, devoutly hoping that he 
would not fall soundly asleep. 

If Natale had only known it, Sora Grazia, 
believing Natale safe for the night, had 
slipped off for a gossip with a friend living 
just back of the church, simply drawing the 
door to behind her and leaving the coast 
clear for flight. And it would not have been 
difficult for the boy to leave a semblance of 
himself tucked under the bed covering, in 
the shape of the roll of discarded clothes and 
shoes ! But little Natale was not possessed 
of a very designing brain, and after all, Luigi 
might have come in untimely, and spoiled 
it all ! 

In a few moments, the would-be runaway 
was fast asleep, while the moon sailed across 
the valley from the eastern toward the 
western sky. 


CHAPTER IX 

THE FLIGHT OF THE BIRD 

W HEN Natale next opened his 
eyes he became very wide 
awake indeed, in an instant. 
In fact, he did not know that he had been 
asleep at all, until the moonlight, slanting 
in, showed Luigi’s long body stretched upon 
the iron bed close by. 

What could have waked Natale? For a 
moment he lay still without recollection of 
the momentous plans made at his early bed- 
time. Then he recalled a sensation of icy 
cold water about his feet, and he remem- 
bered that he had dreamed of a sudden 
plunge into the river while trying to find the 
stepping-stones. It must have been the 
chill of the dream- water that had awakened 


122 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


him ! He sat up and found that he was 
still dressed and in his old clothes. 

Ah ! it was easy to remember all now, 
and after a breathless glance over his 
shoulder at Luigi, who was comfortably 
snoring, Natale slipped out of bed. Catch- 
ing up his old hat and his shoes he stole 
softly over the brick floor and down the 
stone stairs as quietly as any mouse would 
have done. 

Sora Grazia slept downstairs, but the 
door of her room was mercifully closed, and 
Natale knew that she often locked it at 
night. He turned his back upon it, there- 
fore, with confidence, as he felt in the dark- 
ness for the balcony door. He exerted all 
his strength to raise the heavy bar of iron 
which guarded the door. Then he was very 
careful to keep his hold on the bar, as it 
swung downward, lest it should rouse the 
house with its usual clanging fall. The huge 
key was in the lock, and Natale succeeded 


THE FLIGHT OF THE BIRD 123 


in turning it with both hands, although this 
was much more difficult than raising the bar 
above the lock. It creaked dully as it 
turned, and Natale’s heart leaped into his 
throat, and a dozen noises buzzed in his 
ears. 

Breathless, he stood with his hand on the 
latch, afraid to move lest the door behind 
him should open, and everything come to an 
end. But nothing happened, so he swung 
open the door, and without stopping to 
close it behind him, he again caught up his 
shoes, which he had had to set down, and 
ran along the balcony and out into the 
street, his feet pattering softly on the 
stones. 

In his haste he did not stop to think of the 
direction he should take. His only im- 
pulse was to get out into the night some- 
where, away from the houses and street. 
So he ran swiftly along in the shadow cast 
by wall and house, in just the opposite 


124 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


direction from that which would have led 
him past the church tower and through the 
village, out upon the downward road. 
Presently he crouched in a shadow to draw 
on his shoes, then fled onward again. 

Once away, he lost his bearings utterly and 
hurried on without turning, past the small 
house with the Madonna painted on the 
wall, past the large house where the white 
tablet to “ Pietro Pacioni ” gleamed in the 
moonlight, and then downward, by a 
roughly paved path leading to the Campo 
Santo. Perhaps he would have kept on 
aimlessly along San Vito, — the fashionable 
promenade leading always higher along the 
mountain side till it ended in an open 
plateau high up above the valley, — if he 
had not heard steps approaching. Whether 
these steps came from behind or from ahead 
he did not stop to discover. The downward 
path offered safety, and a small pink villa 
threw a dark shadow across its entrance, so 


THE FLIGHT OF THE BIRD 125 


Natale lost not an instant in scudding down 
the friendly by-way. 

On he trotted, past the shrine where the 
tiny Della Robbia Madonna sits under her 
arch, the moonlight touching the shining 
blue of her hood, the yellow of her robe and 
the pink of the baby on her knees with a 
radiance that was almost startling on the 
edge of the shadow. Now the path grew 
level, and the stones were left behind, and 
no more noise of footsteps disturbed the 
quiet. 

A few rods more, and Natale stood in 
front of the small mortuary chapel outside 
the cemetery. The iron gates set in the 
wall of the cemetery were locked, as Natale 
found on gently shaking them. He had 
paused to peep through the slender grating 
into the inclosure where the moonlight 
touched the white tomb of the foreign 
gentleman buried close under the wall, and 
showed so plainly the numbers on the low 


126 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


stakes marking the graves of the nameless 
poor. The shadows of the cypress trees lay 
like long black fingers outstretched upon the 
wilds of weedy undergrowth, and the wind 
stirred dismally on the exposed hillside. 

One day, Natale and Olga had wandered 
together as far as these iron gates. He 
remembered it now, and with the recollec- 
tion he sprang away, eager to continue his 
journey, — then stood still, uncertain as to 
his path. 

The way whieh had brought him down- 
ward came to an abrupt end with the little 
chapel, outside the gates. It would not do 
to lose himself among the chestnut woods in 
search of a path ! Yet, how could he plunge 
down the pathless slopes among the great 
trees, with nothing to guide him but the 
murmur of the river far below Still less 
was he willing to return to the road above 
and turn about to take his way through the 
village and so on out upon the road. He 


THE FLIGHT OF THE BIRD 127 


was almost sure that if he could only see to 
find his way, some downward path from 
where he stood would bring him to a river 
crossing, perhaps a long, long way below the 
arched bridge, and therefore much farther 
on his journey. 

Bewildered and tired, he was almost 
ready to give up his flight, and to creep into 
the dark portico of the little chapel, and 
back into the shade beneath the picture of 
the Saint with the skull in his hand, and 
there end this strange night, which already 
seemed to him longer than any night he had 
ever known. But he roused himself to one 
more effort, and crept around to the back 
wall of the chapel. There, to his joyful 
surprise, he came upon a semblance of a 
path ! 

All indecision was gone now, and he fairly 
slid down the rocky and precipitous way, 
which was more gully than footway, being 
in fact a watercourse for the torrents leaping 


128 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


down the mountain side, after some storm 
of rain, as well as a short cut to the river for 
roughly shod peasant feet. 

More than once Natale stumbled, and 
once he fell headlong, bruising his hands and 
knees, but he did not mind, for the rushing 
of the little river down among the rocks was 
becoming very loud in his ears. 

When at last he came out of the woods, 
and stood on the edge of the waste of 
rounded stones loosely paving the river bed, 
he looked back a moment to where the 
village must be, high above, a huddle of gray 
wall and roof, with the square church tower 
in its midst. All seemed as silent in the 
sleeping town as in the home of the sleeping 
dead on its outskirts. Then, just as Natale 
again turned his back upon the mountain 
side, where perched Cutigliano like a bit of 
gray lichen growing on some mossy bowlder, 
the beautiful, bright, friendly moon slipped 
quite over the mountain in the west, and 


THE FLIGHT OF THE BIRD 129 


darkness fell upon the valley, where deep 
down in its darkest shadow Natale was 
ready to cross the river. The light of the 
moon still touched the chestnut woods 
higher up the slopes, but every moment the 
shadow would be creeping higher and 
higher, until there would be no more moon- 
light on this side the mountain, and only the 
stars would come peeping out at Natale. 

After slipping off his shoes and leggings, 
the boy began picking his way carefully over 
the large dry stones which were worn 
smooth and round by slow wasting in the 
wet seasons, when the river flooded its 
narrow course and spread to the grassy 
banks. The stones rolled under even his 
light footsteps, but Natale kept his balance 
in crossing the smaller stones, and clambered 
patiently over or around the largest ones, 
and presently arrived at the edge of the 
black, rushing water. The brawling Lima 
makes a great ado hereabouts, as it tumbles 


130 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


over the rocks, for its bed slopes decidedly 
all the way to Lucca and beyond, and there 
is no opportunity for it to moderate its 
pace, or calm its chafings against the rocks. 

With the first touch of the icy water upon 
his bared feet, Natale recalled his dream. 
How long ago it had been since he had lain 
safely in his bed under the slanting roof of 
Luigi’s house ! Again and again he tried 
to plant his foot firmly in the midst of the 
swirling water, which was perhaps as much 
as twenty feet wide at that point, but 
always it was deeper and colder than he had 
expected, and the stones more slippery and 
unsteady. Then he began wandering up and 
down the bank, in quest of the stepping- 
stones, which here and there certainly 
crossed the river both above and below the 
arched bridge. Unsuccessful in this, Natale 
finally exerted himself to make a reckless 
dash into the current, where he found him- 
self the next instant up to his waist in the 


THE FLIGHT OF THE BIRD 131 


black water and clinging desperately by 
one free hand to a wet rock, with the in- 
stinct of preserving himself from being 
carried off his feet. Then miserably he felt 
his way back to the dry rocks on the edge 
of the stream, and dropping down upon 
their harsh bosom, he began to cry bitterly. 
‘ He had so hoped there would be a cross- 
ing place ! If he could only find it ! His 
feet were sore with bruises now, and he felt 
as if he could not walk another step. He 
grew cold as he crouched there, sobbing with 
disappointment, for though the sun shines 
hot during the daytime on the chestnut 
trees and the vines of the Apennines, the 
nights, even of summer, are cool, and now 
a chill wind came sweeping down the valley 
from the fir-crowned summits of Abetone. 

Presently the little wanderer roused him- 
self and stood on his feet. Nothing could 
tempt him to try to find his way back to the 
house of the priest, not even aching feet or 


132 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


shivering limbs, but he began to think there 
might be a more sheltered place near by 
— this little boy of the road, who had taken 
many a noontide nap curled up at the foot of 
some wayside tree. Perhaps the earliest light 
of dawn would show him the stepping-stones 
and the road, of which there was no hint 
now in the blackness of darkness across the 
river. Painfully he crept back toward the 
bank, where presently he curled himself into 
a knot at the foot of a huge, distorted old 
chestnut tree, a short distance up the slope. 
The grass was soft and springy about the 
roots of the old tree, and a huge boulder near 
by shut off the wind from Natale’s shivering 
legs. So, with a sigh of content, and for 
the first time tasting the sweets of his new 
freedom, the little acrobat closed his eyes 
upon the stars winking down at him from 
above the stirring leaves, and fell asleep for 
the second time that night. 


CHAPTER X 


ON THE WING 

ON G before N atale waked, the day had 



dawned, but the sun had not long 


^ ^ looked down into the valley before 
he turned stiffly on his grassy couch and 
rubbed his eyes. Then, however, he lost not 
an instant in taking up his journey where it 
had left off the night before. 

How easy it was in the light of the sun- 
beams of the early morning to spring over 
the dry stones of the bank, and with a swift 
glance up and down select a safe place to 
cross the water which had seemed so dan- 
gerous and cruel in the dark. 

The daylight changed everything, of 
course, and it was but a few moments after 
waking before he was across the stream and 


134 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


scrambling up to the low wall bounding the 
road on the river side. From the inner 
edge of the road the mountains rose pre- 
cipitately. 

As Natale clambered over the wall the 
church bells of Cutigliano burst into a 
wrangle of sound, which must have echoed 
from one end of the village to the other. 
Though the distance softened the metallic 
tones, the little boy was startled by them 
into a scamper away down the sunlit road 
as if the mischievous village boys whose 
office it was to ring the bells were in head- 
long chase after him. The day must have 
been the festa of some saint, and for a long 
time Natale heard the bells’ voices, sweet- 
ened more and more as his bare feet trudged 
onward and the distance fell between him 
and them. But he soon gave up his running 
because his legs were stiff and his feet sore, 
and as yet no one appeared coming along 
the road behind him, in pursuit. 


ON THE WING 


135 


There had been no doubt in his own mind 
of the direction he should take after once 
gaining the road. He knew that Giovanni 
and Antonio with the house-wagon had been 
bound for the Bagni di Lucca, and also he 
knew that the road to the Bagni led down- 
ward with the stream, and not up toward 
the cold region of Abetone, the “Great Fir 
Tree.” 

So all he had to do was to follow the road, 
broad and white, by the way they had come 
three weeks before, without need, even, of 
asking his way of the peasants he should 
meet. He had turned the shoulder of a great 
green mountain-spur which entirely shut 
off the view of Cutigliano before he would 
stop for an instant in his lame tramping. 
Once assured that the town was out of sight 
behind him, he sat down breathlessly on 
one of the heaps of loose stones such as flank 
every mountain road in Italy. Then he 
deliberately took each foot in turn in his 


136 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


small hands and gravely and pitifully 
examined its bruises. There was nothing 
to be done, then, but plant them in the road 
again and continue his way. 

For an hour or niore he trudged painfully 
on, but the stiffness in his legs left him after 
a while, and he began to be only hungry. 
He wished he had thought of hiding in his 
pocket, the night before, a crust of the dark, 
coarse bread he loved, and which had al- 
ways been plentiful at Sora Grazia’s. But 
the coppers jingled comfortably there in- 
stead, and Natale contented himself to 
wait for breakfast till he should pass some 
bread shop along the road. 

The morning air was sweet with the fresh- 
ness of early day, and the delicious odor of 
the wild thyme’s tiny blossoms. Tall hare- 
bells nodded to him from the thyme and 
heather bank shoulder-high above the road, 
and sparkled with the sunshine and dew 
upon their purple flowerets. The river. 


ON THE WING 


137 


which in the darkness had seemed to mock 
him with its roaring, now only murmured 
softly as it slipped over the stones in the 
sunlight. 

By and by, Natale began to meet people 
in the road, men with donkeys bearing huge 
basketfuls of wet grass and wild flowers 
shorn from the steep terraces above for the 
cow or donkey at home, and women tramp- 
ing in their thick-soled shoes to Cutigliano 
with baskets of fresh fruit or eggs or cheeses 
for the summer hotels balanced on their 
heads. From all of these Natale kept his face 
steadily averted, lest they should bear back 
to the town tidings of his going. Usually, 
after passing a group of these wayfarers, the 
boy broke into a quick run in order to 
lengthen the distance between them and 
himself, but these spurts of speed availed 
him little, for he had always to stop and rest 
afterward, and so lost many more minutes 
than he had gained of the golden day. 


138 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


The road had already become a curving 
white glare before Natale came in sight of a 
long stone house having many windows and 
doors, and standing on the inner edge of the 
road. He came upon it suddenly, on turn- 
ing a sharp curve, and then he saw that 
another house faced it on the opposite side 
of the road, and that an inviting shade lay 
between. The back of one of the houses 
looked directly upon the steep slope of the 
mountain behind, while the rear wall of its 
opposite neighbor had its foundation in the 
rocky banks of the tumbling river. In the 
shade between, barefoot peasant children 
played noisily. Near by, a stream of spring 
water, clear and cold, trickled from a 
wooden trough into a rough stone basin. 

And here at last were rest and food and 
drink for the runaway, — only no one must 
learn that he was a runaway ! 

A fat and black-eyed housewife with arms 
akimbo stood in one of the doors, and as 


ON THE WING 


139 


Natale came up to her on limping feet, she 
eyed him with interest from the stone of the 
doorstep. 

“Will you give me a little piece of bread, 
signora ? See, I have money,” said Natale, 
showing her a handful of Mr. Grantly’s 
copper coins in his open palm. 

“A bit of bread you shall have, to be sure, 
and your soldi you shall keep, little one,” 
the good-natured creature promptly an- 
swered, and while the children left their 
play and gathered about Natale, with 
friendly eyes, their mother disappeared into 
the very small and dusky shop behind. 

“There, sit down and eat,” she said, 
returning with a hunk of bread and a 
generous lump of cheese on a coarse plate 
in her hand. 

As Natale received the plate and moved 
rather lamely toward the dripping fountain 
in the shade, the children ran ahead, and 
one filled a rusty tin cup with the cold 


140 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


water and had it ready for Natale by the 
time he reached the mossy brink of the 
fountain. 

These little ones of the road, wild and rude 
enough in their play, were well used to offer- 
ing the ‘‘cup of cold water” to the passing 
wayfarer, and Natale’s thirsty throat gulped 
the draught gratefully. 

There was something about the child 
which arrested the attention of the woman 
more than the ordinary passer-by often did, 
and she also stood watching Natale break- 
fast hungrily. 

He was shy and downcast, fearing diflS- 
cult questions, and as soon as the last 
crumb of bread and cheese had disappeared 
he got to his feet, setting the empty plate 
on the margin of the fountain. 

“Thank you, signora, and good-by,” he 
said, and was off. 

“No, but wait!” she cried, laying her 
hand on his shrinking shoulder. “You 


ON THE WING 


141 


have eaten my bread; now answer my 
questions. What is your name, picino,^ 
and where are you going?” 

‘‘Down the road,” was the shyly spoken 
answer to the last question, with a quiet 
waiving of the first. “Please let me go, 
signora. It is already late, and I must 
hasten.” 

“Well, go!” she exclaimed then, “and a 
good journey to you!” But she stood 
watching him trudge briskly away from her 
until another curve in the zigzag road hid 
him from her sight. 

“Some stranger’s child !” she muttered to 
herself, going back to the doorstep. “I 
have never seen him pass here before, and 
few there be who pass by without the 
knowledge of Chiara. Well, I am glad he 
has his soldi safe in his pocket. May the 
saints protect and feed my own children 
when they go a- wandering ! You, Beppo ! 


1 Little boy. 


142 THE LITTLE ACROBAT j 

keep your head out of the dust of the 
road!” 

‘‘Mama, mama, Beppino is making capi- 
tomboli, such as the boy who was here just now 
made in the circus at Cutigliano, on the day 
we went with our father to the big tent ! Do 
you not remember ? ’’cried an admiring small 
sister of Beppo. “ See, our Beppo does them 
even better than the other boy, mama I ” 

The woman gave a little start of recol- 
lection, and then dismissed the idea which 
had occurred to her, as impossible — for- 
tunately, perhaps, for Natale. 

“ Silly girl ! The circus people went down 
the road a week ago to the Bagni, do you not 
remember? How should the boy be seven 
days behind ? No more capitomboliy I say, 
Beppo mio, in all this dust !” 

In a carriage, with two good horses and a 
fine cracking whip behind them, one may 
drive from Cutigliano down to the Baths of 
Lucca in the first half of a summer’s day. 



Capitomboli, such as the boy who was here just now made m the 
circus at Cutigliano.” Page 142, 



ON THE WING 


143 


On two tired slim little legs, one would need 
much more time to accomplish the journey. 
Also when one has been for six days im- 
prisoned within stone walls, one does not 
hurry — if fairly out of danger — along 
beauteous and fresh-smelling paths of free- 
dom. 

Every hour or so after leaving the woman 
and children at the fountain, Natale stopped 
for a rest along the way. Sometimes he sat 
down on a heap of mending stones by the 
wayside, in company with some stone- 
breaker hammering away in the shade of 
his sun screen, a rude lattice of chestnut 
boughs propped behind the heap of stones. 

The monotonous clink of the hammer 
breaking the sharp-edged stones was usually 
stayed as the lonely worker turned to chat 
with the large-eyed child hovering near. 
Only once or twice was Natale’s cheerful 
'"Buon" ^ returned by an unwelcom- 


^ Good morning. 


144 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


ing growl or by sour silence. In such cases, 
the dawdling feet made all haste to pass and 
seek a resting-place in the shade of some 
breeze-rustled chestnut tree quite out of 
sight of the cross stone-breaker. 

The second night was passed as the first 
had been, out of doors, after a supper of hot 
rice paid for at an osteria,^ a short way 
back along the road. Natale might have 
slept, as well, at the little inn, but he was 
too unused to roofs to dream of proposing 
it, and the absent-minded old landlord had 
not seemed to be thinking of anything but 
puffing away at his pipe, as Natale slipped 
past him and out of the dingy passage-way, 
after paying for his food. 

A long-bodied two-wheeled cart stood 
outside the inn door, its shafts’ ends resting 
on the ground, its rear high in air, and 
Natale, with an instinct for sleeping above 
wheels, had decided to return to the cart 


^ Inn. 


ON THE WING 


145 


for a night’s lodging place when the world 
should be dark again. But sleep over- 
took him as he lay waiting at the foot 
of a tree to which he had scrambled from 
the road below, and when he roused, 
dawn was staining the pale sky with 
rose color. 

The next day promised to pass as the 
first had done, — with slipping shyly past 
occasional houses of entertainment along 
the way, with fingerings to stare into the 
mysterious depths of some noisy mill in 
league with the tumbling river, and with 
long, monotonous trampings, between times, 
along the smooth road, bordered always by 
the mountains and the river. As the road 
neared the valley, it crossed dashing streams 
hurrying to join their waters to the broader 
water of the river, and so solid was the stone 
masonry of the arches that one would never 
have known that he was crossing a bridge 
but for the sparkle and the laughter of the 


146 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


foaming water as it dashed under the road 
and out again. 

Many times Natale, himself a small dark 
speck on the endless white road, looked up 
the long mountain slopes, green in the sun- 
light, purple in the shadow, and glimpsed 
high above him on the giddy heights the 
climbing roofs of some hoary old mountain 
town, away out of hearing of the busy 
river, out of reach of traveling circus wagons, 
and which, 

“ Like an eagle’s nest hangs on the crest 
Of purple Apennine.” 

It was past noon of the second day when 
Natale entered a village on a level with the 
highway. Here the road suddenly changed 
into a stone-paved street, running between 
high houses and echoing with the tramp of 
wooden-soled shoes and the patter of don- 
keys’ hoofs. 

He stopped at the door of a sour-smelling 
wine shop where sat a man on a stool out- 


ON THE WING 


147 


side the door. To him the little boy put 
his question as to whether this town might 
perhaps be very near to the Bagni di Lucca. 
This man wore a red fez on his bushy, black 
head, and down his long, black beard trickled 
drops from the wine cup at his lips. The 
fellow did not stop his drinking long enough 
to reply in so many words to the question, 
but a decided shaking of his head and the 
pointing of a long, dirty finger onward suffi- 
ciently enlightened Natale, and he kept 
slowly on his way. 

In passing a small baker’s shop, he 
stopped and bought a great ring of sweetish 
bread, and then slipping his arm through 
this, he went more cheerily onward. There 
were still many soldi left in his pocket, and 
surely this beautiful ring of bread would last 
until the Bagni di Lucca should come in 
sight, with, of course, the dear yellow tent 
set in its midst ! 

One of the last houses he passed as he left 


148 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


the town was entered through a garden by 
a huge wooden door opening upon the 
cobblestones of the street. This door 
stood ajaj, and Natale stayed his steps for 
a moment to gaze through the aperture 
down a charming vista of trellised vines 
supported on crumbling white columns of 
masonry. Green and gold lights played 
over the rough paving-stones of the cloister- 
like colonnade through the latticework 
above. Halfway down this corridor, two 
or three girls romped and sang together, 
their scarlet kerchiefs and the rich blues of 
their skirts making dashes of vivid color in 
the shade where they lounged. Pale jewels 
of grapes, already growing pink and ame- 
thystine, crowded the vines with promise of 
luscious sweetness when their full time 
should come. 

The girls peered back at the travel-worn 
lad peering in at them, but when the largest 
of them called mockingly to him, ‘‘Enter, 


ON THE WING 


149 


signore !” Natale ran away down the street 
and again out upon the road. The girls 
had made him think of Arduina and Olga 
and little Maria, and away down at the end 
of the corridor he had caught a glimpse of 
a ^ay-haired woman sitting on a flight of 
broken stone steps, with an infant on her 
lap. His heart swelled with homesickness. 
If only he might see Nonna once again ! 
How long was the monotonous road to 
Bagni di Lucca ! 

The day, however, was not to close with- 
out an exciting and important event. 


CHAPTER XI 

FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 

N ATALE sat down in his leisurely 
fashion on the low wall bounding 
the road just beyond the town and 
began daintily nibbling around the crisp, 
sugared edges of his bread ring. It was 
mid-afternoon, and while his jaws worked 
steadily, his wide bright eyes watched with 
interest two bicyclists toiling up the hill and 
trundling their wheels alongside. As they 
passed him by without a glance, their faces 
red and perspiring, and their shoes whitened 
with the light dust, the boy’s eyes still fol- 
lowed them and lighted upon a queer figure 
coming from the town he had just quitted. 
It was the red-capped, swarthy-faced man 


FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 151 


of the wine-shop door, and now his shoulders 
were bent under a pack slung on his back, 
and his legs were bowed as he limped along, 
and he wore an old overcoat much too long, 
which had seen better days upon another’s 
shoulders. 

The wheelmen paid no attention to this 
fellow, as he stopped on meeting them and 
perhaps offered them a sight of his wares 
hidden in the pack, so the peddler presently 
came up with Natale, grumbling sourly. 

‘‘These foreigners without manners !” he 
growled, planting himself in front of the 
little boy’s swinging legs. “Ah! you are 
the boy who goes to the Bagni. Come, I 
also go thither. We shall be companions 
merry enough ! ” 

Natale had no fancy for joining company 
with this man who frowned with his black 
brows and grinned, in turn, with big white 
teeth gleaming in his hairy face, but neither 
had he the courage to demur. Therefore, 


152 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


he slipped down unwillingly from his perch 
and trotted along at the peddler’s side. 

Fortunately, the man asked no questions 
and spoke little, and before evening, his 
steady tramp had led Natale over more 
miles than the whole previous day had 
carried him. Little cared this strange, 
silent fellow for leaning over walls to gaze 
at the foaming water singing over the rocks, 
or for idly resting on a bridge to watch the 
white cloud-ships crossing the azure sea 
overhead, as the white sails of the orange 
boats ply the blue waves between Sicily 
and the Italian coast, and to dream of 
future glory as an acrobat of renown ! 

The sun had again sunk behind the 
rounded summits in the west, when the 
peddler at last stood still and grinned down 
upon the panting child. 

“One easily sees that you are no traveler,” 
he said in his. hoarse, unpleasant voice. 
“Now we will sit down here by the roadside 


FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 153 


and make our beds for the night. Did you 
mention supper? The bracelet you wear 
on your arm will suffice for us both, if we 
divide it according to the size of our 
stomachs. Ecco!’' And Natale’s precious 
ring of sweetened bread was rudely snatcTied 
from his arm. 

Naturally, Natale was most indignant at 
being treated in this manner by so perfect 
a stranger, and he did not hesitate to re- 
monstrate. 

“But the bread is mine, signore! I 
bought it with my own soldi in the town,” 
he cried, clutching at the beautiful ring of 
bread, already being broken in two by the 
peddler’s dirty fingers. 

'"Soldi!"' echoed the man; “and where 
are your precious soldi ? ” 

“At the shop where I bought the bread, 
of course,” was the shrewd reply, and not 
a coin remaining in Natale’s pocket jostled 
against its neighbor now. They kept as 


154 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


quiet as if they knew that long, eager fingers 
were ready to pounce upon them. 

Then a change came over the peddler’s 
manner, and he showed his unpleasant- 
looking teeth in a broad smile. Perhaps 
he was planning a look into those little 
pockets by and by, who knows ? 

“What a clever boy you are !” he cried. 
“Well, as you are also such a hungry little 
beast, take back your bread, and for a 
relish I shall give you a smell of my own 
supper. See ! ” 

So speaking, he drew a roll of sausage 
from a pocket of his long coat. The sausage 
was wrapped in a soiled handkerchief, and 
there was a hunk of black bread with it. 
A knife with a curious curved handle and 
long, shining blade was next produced, and 
the peddler went to work, alternately whack- 
ing off bits of the highly seasoned meat 
and the hard bread, and devouring them 
with crunching teeth and smacking lips. 


FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 155 


Natale gnawed industriously at his own 
bread without even thinking of offering to 
barter a portion of it for a taste of the savory 
sausage. There was a kind of fascination 
in watching the ugly fellow eat, and the 
wondering brown eyes were fixed upon the 
peddler’s surly face. 

It was now the close of a warm after- 
noon. A light haze wrapped the more dis- 
tant mountains in misty blue, a chirring of 
insects stirred the silence about the travelers, 
and now and then a carriage or cart whisked 
downward, or toiled upward, along the road, 
accompanied by the jingle of harness bells 
and the whooping cries of the drivers. A 
fog of white dust rose behind every passing 
vehicle, and the chestnut leaves overhead, 
long unwashed by rain, hung grimy and 
listless in the heavy air. 

As the peddler supped, large drops of 
sweat gathered on his long, red nose and 
dripped down his black beard, while his 


156 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


face grew flushed and more scowling than 
ever. Presently, with an angry movement 
which startled Nat ale half out of his wits, 
he dropped the sausage and knife to the 
ground and tore off his coat. 

“ Poor men have no choice ! ” he muttered. 
“Bare shoulders in winter, the cast-off 
winter coat of an Englishman in summer !” 

The soiled and tattered old coat was 
tossed aside, falling uncomfortably close to 
Natale’s feet, but he did not dare to push it 
away with disdainful touch. The peddler’s 
meal now came to an end, the remains of the 
sausage were gathered up with the cruel- 
looking knife and laid aside with the hand- 
kerchief, after which the peddler, with a 
satisfled grunt, sprawled himself on his 
side — to sleep, as Natale devoutly hoped. 

But not quite yet was the man ready for 
sleep. Reaching for his pack, with a lazy 
movement from where he lay, he un- 
strapped it and drew from among the coarse 


FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 157 


laces and horn buttons inside a flat bottle, 
which he uncorked and turned up to his 
lips. As the liquor gurgled down his throat 
and its strong odor tainted the air, Natale 
let his eyes fall to the uncomely garment 
lying within touch of his fingers. 

Then the boy’s heart leaped into his 
throat, and it seemed as if he would suffocate 
where he sat. He dared not move, and 
bravely he looked away from the thing 
which lay within such easy reach of his long- 
ing hands, half-in, half-out of the fellow’s 
old coat pocket. 

If only the peddling thief would go off 
into a drunken sleep ! 

For there, close by, lay Giovanni’s old 
pocketbook of stamped Spanish leather, 
stained and battered, as Natale had always 
known it ! 

Who could tell whether any money still 
remained in it.^^ There was nothing to do 
but wait till the man should go to sleep, and 


158 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


then, stealthily drawing the pocketbook 
away from the overcoat, speed down the 
road to a safe distance and find out all 
about it. 

He had not long to wait before the peddler 
returned the bottle to the pack, and then, 
disposing himself on the ground, sank into 
an open-mouthed slumber. 

Only when quite sure that the sleep was 
real did Natale steal away on noiseless feet, 
prize in hand, across the shallow ditch bor- 
dering the road, and onward to the shelter 
of a ruined shed quite out of sight of their 
resting-place. Putting the shed between 
him and the road, Natale unstrapped the 
pocketbook with trembling eagerness. 

There lay the notes into which Giovanni 
had from time to time changed the cumber- 
some copper soldi of their earnings ! There 
were the dingy blue five-franc notes, with 
many one and two-franc notes of a most 
uncompromising dirt color ! 


FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 159 


The boy dared not take time to count 
them all. The fierce ogre asleep under the 
tree might rouse at any moment and find the 
pocketbook gone. Away, away, he must 
fly, on and on toward the Bagni di Lucca, 
even though evening was at hand, and a 
gray blanket of cloud threatened to hide 
the coming stars. So the little feet twinkled 
away through the dust, Natale’s heart now 
heavy with the dread of what was behind, 
now light with the joy of what might be 
ahead. As the warm dusk fell, it seemed 
safe to walk again, although every sound 
from behind made Natale’s heart seem to 
leap into his throat. Indeed, it seemed 
pretty much to stay in his throat, until, by 
and by, he came upon some one who was 
to give him most welcome news. 

He had traveled half a mile farther, and 
still it was not yet dark when he sighted a 
cluster of houses ahead and heard cheerful 
human voices. Coming up to the first 


160 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


house, he found a pretty, plump young 
mother on her doorstep, cuddling a nursling 
on her breast. From across the road and 
about the house came busy sounds of sheep 
and cows being housed for the night in their 
thatched pens, and nobody seemed at 
leisure except the laughing woman with the 
crowing baby in her arms. 

On plying the woman with his usual 
question, Natale learned that the end of 
his pilgrimage was indeed “just down the 
road a little distance”, although, on such 
short legs as his, the woman added thought- 
fully, it might take two hours more of brisk 
walking to reach even the big circus tent, 
standing on the outskirts of the Bagni all 
the past week. 

Ah ! and was the circus still there ? 

Of that the woman could not speak 
certainly, as some passer-by had mentioned 
only the day before that but one or two 
more performances were to be given before 


FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 161 


the circo moved on to Lucca. She herself 
had wished to go to see the wonderful 
Antonio Bisbini, also the little Olga who 
had no more fear of a great horse’s hoofs 
than she herself of her baby’s brown toes. 
But how was a woman to leave her house 
and the tired men folks, to tramp down 
the hill and up again at night, with a 
heavy baby in her arms.^ Was the little 
boy hoping to reach the tent in time for the 
night’s exhibition ? 

Natale’s heart had thrilled at the mention 
of Antonio’s magic name, and his spine 
straightened and his head was lifted with 
the pride of conscious relationship with the 
hero of the circus. He gave but a thought 
now to Olga’s usurpation of his place in the 
ring. For was he not returning to his own 
again, with the stolen pocketbook in the 
breast of his blouse? What a welcome 
there would be for him now ! 

‘‘Well, good night. Umbo, if you will go. 


162 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


and may you enjoy seeing the riding in the 
tent!’’ the woman called to him, looking 
wistfully after the little figure plodding 
away, after a polite return of her farewell. 

Natale’s heart was carefree now, as he 
limped lamely onward to the tune of the 
“ Dead March,” humming the air as he 
went. 

The road had been growing more level 
for some hours as it entered the valley, and 
the river flowed more still and deep. The 
hush of night gathered under the trees, and 
the birds and insects went to rest or noise- 
lessly crept from their haunts about vine 
and root, intent upon the business of the 
hour. 

As signs of the famous Baths of Lucca 
began to appear at certain curves in the 
road, Natale became possessed of but 
one idea. Down the river he began to see 
the lights of the town, and he even thought 
he heard the notes of band music, which. 


FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 163 


in truth, were wafted to his ears from the 
terrace of the Casino. His head was full 
of plans of stealing into the tent, and for at 
least this last night at Bagni di Lucca, play- 
ing his own part in the dying-horse act. 
He would not take precious moments now 
for practicing a somersault or wheel, as he 
went along, but it was easy to rehearse the 
dialogue over the dying brute — if only his 
tired, tired legs could keep the road, and his 
aching eyes find the old yellow tent set up 
somewhere among the trees. 

Presently, the gleaming eyes of bicycles 
began to whiz by, and a squarely built, 
many-windowed villa or two rose flush with 
the road. A little farther now, and the tent 
would surely appear, with perhaps Cara in 
her red dress at the doorway, and the band 
playing outside in the light of the big lamp ! 

Laughing stragglers now sauntered here 
and there, none noticing the child making 
his dizzy way among them toward a flare 


164 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


of light on one side where the trees fell 
apart. One would have hardly believed it 
possible that there was room for even the 
tent of the Circo Equestre of Antonio 
Bisbini and Giovanni Marzuchetti in the 
space between the long storehouse of corn 
and the terraced hillside behind. Yet, not 
only was the tent there, spread to its full 
circle and height, but the brown wagon also 
was visible, drawn within its shadow, and 
now the staring brown eyes of the little 
wanderer had found them both. 

Yes, there was the dear old tent, with its 
white patches upon the dull yellow, showing 
against the vine-clad hillsides of the Bagni. 
Also, there was the smoky lamp fastened to 
a post, where two ways met and parted. 
There was the usual crowd gathered out- 
side about the entrance where Cara in her 
red dress and gauzy veil watched over the 
money bowl, in wait for some possible late- 
arriving spectator. The big reflecting Ian- 


FLUTTERING A LITTLE FARTHER 165 


tern on the table showed the wistful features 
of the outsiders as they crowded about the 
tent. 

As Natale crept around the tent, he saw 
the bare, brown legs of some trespassing 
youngster following squirming head and 
shoulders inside, under the curtain by way 
of the ground. In former times, the little 
acrobat would have been the first to raise 
an alarm and assist with alacrity in the 
ignominious expulsion of the intruder who 
wanted to see the show, and yet keep his 
soldi in his pocket, if such were there. But 
the sight of the enterprising offender made 
little impression on Natale’s mind now, as 
he stepped past the struggling legs, for, the 
hour being much later than he thought, the 
band inside just then struck up the familiar 
schottisch, and Natale knew that II Duca 
was even now treading the ring in a dignified 
dance, led by Giovanni himself. His heart 
gave a suffocating throb, and his cheeks 


166 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


burned. Then he shivered with cold, and 
his weary legs faltered before the daring 
deed about to be perpetrated. 

There was plenty of time, even yet, and 
he would do it even if Giovanni should strike 
him to the ground with his cracking whip, 
which had never yet, however, been raised 
against him with more than threatening 
intent. 

He stopped to listen a moment longer 
to the music before entering. Yes, there it 
was, the schottisch, accompanied by the 
beat of the clever hoofs. Then, as he 
knew the moment was at hand for II Duca 
to drop dying in the ring, Natale crept 
swiftly in among the players gathered as 
usual in the small tent behind. Olga was 
there and Arduina, in their fanciful cos- 
tumes, and Elvira, his mother, waiting for 
their ‘‘cues.” 


CHAPTER XII 

AT LAST 

T he small, pale apparition of Natale, 
suddenly projected into their midst, 
so startled them all that even Olga 
forgot to listen for the thud of II Duca’s 
heavy body on the ground and the sound of 
his groans. They stared open-mouthed for 
an instant, and then the apparition van- 
ished as suddenly as it had appeared. 

But the strains of the “Dead March” 
now recalled little Olga to herself, and she 
darted from behind the curtain and out into 
the light of the oil lamp, only to hear a 
familiar boyish voice instead of her own 
answering shrilly Giovanni’s question, 
“What are you crying about, child ?” 
“Because our horse is dead !” 


168 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


“But are you sure he is quite dead?’’ 
And Giovanni’s voice faltered with sudden 
fear, as he gazed at Natale’s small, dusty 
figure kneeling at the horse’s head, with 
Oh ! such a world of pleading in his dark 
eyes and folded hands. 

“Quite dead!” wailed Natale. 

“Get up and feel his pulse, boy. If 
there is any pulse he is not dead ! ” Giovanni 
spoke fiercely, but there was no frown upon 
his face. 

And so the farce went on as usual, to the 
end, while Olga, with pouting lips, slipped 
behind the curtain again and joined the 
others who were, every one, peeping in to 
see little Natale do his beloved dying-horse 
act. 

The little girl had come to enjoy her bit 
of acting with Giovanni and II Duca, for 
kneeling with folded hands and sobbing 
breath was a pretty attitude, always loudly 
applauded, and she no longer feared that 


AT LAST 


169 


II Duca would lift his faithful hoof against 
her. But now, here was Natale back again, 
and his shrill little voice going over the silly 
replies to the clown in his own, old way. 
Well, it would be rather nice, after all, to 
have Natale again, and she would not fuss 
about it as there were so few things he could 
really do, while she was learning new feats 
already, and would soon be riding Tesoro 
bareback around the ring. 

A perfect storm of applause succeeded the 
end of the dialogue, when II Duca scrambled 
to his feet, and the tent was filled with cries 
for a repetition of the scene. But Gio- 
vanni turned swiftly and lifted Natale to 
the horse’s back, only in time to prevent the 
child’s falling to the ground, as if stunned 
by the noise of the shouting. Out of the 
ring and through the smaller tent to the 
open air beyond II Duca pranced proudly, 
with Giovanni at his bridle, holding Natale 
in his place with his free hand. 


170 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


Outside, they laid the child down on the 
warm ground in the dim light, and Arduina 
brought a cupful of water and bathed his 
face, while Olga stood by, and Antonio and 
Elvira went back to help Giovanni with his 
table-leaping inside. 

“He is not dead, is he, Arduina.^” Olga 
asked in a frightened voice. “Feel his pulse 
as we do II Duca’s !” 

“Hurry and call Nonna!” the older girl 
urged nervously. “We shall have to go in, 
the very next thing after this, and Nonna 
will know what to do.” 

So when Natale next opened his eyes, the 
light of a sputtering candle showed him the 
gray head of dear Nonna bent over him. 
He lay on a small mattress in a corner, and 
the smoke-stained ceiling of the house-wagon 
shut out the sky. 

“Ecco ! he opens his eyes, my bimbo ! my 
Natalino ! Carino,^ what does it all mean ? 


Darling. 


AT LAST 


171 


Tell Nonna how you have come back to the 
drco ! ” 

But at first Natale only lifted one hand 
to stroke the dear, wrinkled face of Nonna, 
in smiling content. After a little, he laid 
his hand on the breast of his blouse and 
begged to be allowed to go to Giovanni. 

‘‘He will not scold me for coming back 
when he sees what I have brought with 
me,” he urged. 

But Nonna reminded him that the tent 
was still crowded with spectators, — did 
he not hear the music close by, and the 
laughter of the people, as the clown and 
Antonio and Arduina did the funny pan- 
tomime 

Natale lay back listening, with a happy 
smile on his lips, while Nonna went to blow 
up the coals of a small fire on the ground 
outside, and to hurry the broth that Natale 
might have nourishment. She could not 
prevail upon the boy to confide to her 


172 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


what he was so anxious to tell his step- 
father, and she left him alone, too glad to 
have him returned to them, to grumble over 
his reticence. 

Of all the children, Natale most sweetly 
recalled her own son’s childhood, and 
Antonio’s boyish affection for her, his 
cheeriness and obedience, had seemed to 
live again in Natale, although he was 
Elvira’s son, and no grandson, at all, of her 
own. 

The little ones, Tito, Maria, Gigi and the 
rest, were asleep in their corners, and Nonna 
had been sitting at rest in the wagon door 
when Olga had rushed up with the news that 
Natale had arrived and lay dying, perhaps, 
on the ground outside the tent. It was 
Nonna’s strong arms that had borne him 
away to the house-wagon, and Nonna’s 
vigorous rubbings and applications of cold 
water that had brought him out of the 
half -swoon of exhaustion. So Nonna was 


AT LAST 


173 


content with her work, and would not press 
Natalino’s secret from him. 

By the time the performance was over, 
and the merry-makers had streamed out 
whistling, chatting and laughing together, 
and had gone their ways homeward, Natale, 
fed and rested, was sitting up bright-eyed 
and eager to announce his news. 

It was stuffy and hot in the wagon, and 
Giovanni went to fetch the boy outside, the 
moment the tent had emptied and the 
players were at leisure. Olga had not even 
taken time to change the yellow satin 
blouse and pink tights for her usual faded 
cotton frock. As for Antonio, he had only 
slipped his feet into a pair of loose slippers, 
so the great acrobat stood before Natale in 
all the glory of his spangled black velvet 
and shapely, pink-clad limbs. 

As the night was dark, one of the lamps 
was brought from the tent, and a wild, 
gypsy-like scene its rays revealed under the 


174 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


trees about the steps of the house-wagon. 
Elvira, in an access of motherly tender- 
ness, gathered Natale to her red satin 
bosom, and called him by all the musical 
pet names belonging to the boys and girls 
of Italy, while the musicians peeped over 
the shoulders of the actors and wondered 
how little Natale had ever found his way on 
foot all the way from Cutigliano to the 
Bagni. 

“The tramping will have limbered up his 
legs !” one whispered to another. 

“Stiffened them, rather !” was the reply, 
and then everybody stopped talking and 
only gazed the harder as Natale put his 
hand within the breast of his blouse and 
drew out the old leather pocketbook. 

“There, Giovanni!” he said simply, 
reaching the book toward his stepfather. 
“The ugly, black peddler with the red cap 
like our Leo’s stole the money, and while he 
slept on his back, by the road, I stole Jt from 


AT LAST 


175 


him, and then — Oh, how fast I ran and 
ran that he might not catch me and kill me 
with his long, sharp knife !” 

Giovanni, speechless with astonishment 
and joy, solemnly received and kissed and 
opened the pocketbook, and then spread 
out the notes, one by one, on his knee, while 
the rest crowded around, counting them 
aloud. 

What if all should not be there ? Natale’s 
eyes shone feverishly as he leaned forward 
from his mother’s Imee, his gaze alternately 
upon the clown’s face, and the long, lithe 
fingers handling the money. 

Five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five, 
thirty, thirty-five, forty, forty-five, fifty, 
fifty-five, sixty, sixty-five, seventy, seventy- 
five, eighty, eighty-two, eighty-four, eighty- 
six, eighty-eight, ninety, ninety-one, ninety- 
two, ninety-three, ninety-four, ninety-five, 
ninety-six, ninety-seven, ninety-eight, 
ninety-nine, one hundred! 


176 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


Natale’s head dropped back against the 
red satin shoulder of his mother, and his 
large eyes gazed wistfully into Giovanni’s 
face. 

Would they let him stay now that he had 
come all the weary way ‘‘after the wagon”, 
bringing them the lost money ? Their wel- 
come had been encouraging ; would they let 
him remain, or must he be sent back to 
Cutigliano, to the priest, to Sora Grazia, 
to school, to imprisonment in a house with- 
out wheels, and without Nonna ? 

It was Antonio Bisbini who brought up 
the question finally and in a manner settled 
it with his slow-spoken words. Everybody 
had wondered and rejoiced over the safe 
return of the pocketbook, with the money 
untouched, and Natale had had to tell all 
about the peddler, and the risks he had run 
of rousing the fellow from sleep in making 
his escape with the pocketbook. 

“He was the man who teased me to buy 


AT LAST 


177 


the beautiful diamond brooch on the day of 
San Lorenzo!” cried pretty Arduina, who 
well remembered the peddler’s flattering 
attentions to her in his hope of flnding a 
purchaser for his paltry glass jewelry. 

^‘And the same who so frightened our 
Tito outside the church,” Nonna chimed 
in indignantly. ‘‘And he all the time pre- 
tended to be so pious and anxious to see the 
saints’ relics in the church ! No wonder 
Tito cried at the snapping of those dirty, 
thievish fingers in his little face. The 
saints only know how he found the money 
in Giovanni’s coat-pocket hung in the 
tent !” 

“Mama mia, do you remember how stiff 
my legs were when I played at leaping with 
the boys at school in Florence Antonio, 
the finished acrobat, asked thoughtfully, 
breaking a long straw with his fingers and 
looking at nobody. His blond head reached 
almost to the lowest boughs of the chestnut 


178 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


tree under which he stood, and the lamp- 
light flared over his fair face and glittering 
costume. 

Natale sat up to hear the words of this 
oracle, and even slipped off the satin lap of 
Elvira to the ground, in order to be nearer 
Antonio. 

“I remember that you were a studious 
boy,” Nonna murmured in reply, with a 
note of the old bitterness in her voice. 

‘‘Natale has done a good work in return- 
ing the money to us, Giovanni,” the acrobat 
continued. “Why send him back to the 
foreigners ? He was unhappy, or he would 
never have come all this distance alone — 
mere baby that he is.” 

“And the Englishwoman’s money .^” 
Giovanni asked in a businesslike tone. 

“What has been used, replace from the 
pocketbook. It is not much, as we have 
taken in so good a siun, here at the Bagni. 
Leo can ride back with it to Cutigliano 


AT LAST 


179 


to-morrow morning, and return in time for 
our last night here.” 

^^Ebbene!’' said Giovanni, and this mean- 
ing ‘‘All right, with a very good will,” so it 
was decided, and then everybody hurried 
to get into comfortable old clothes and to 
eat supper. 

Leo was sent to the nearest wine shop for 
a bottle of good red wine that the troop 
might drink to the joy of Natale’s return 
and the recovery of the money ; also to the 
just discomfiture of all thieving peddlers. 

Long before the evening came to an end, 
a tired but most happy little boy had crept 
into the shadow and fallen asleep, with his 
head pillowed against Nonna’s knee. 

“I am glad thou art come back to us, 
Natalino,” she whispered in the softest 
Italian above the tangled brown curls, 
while the rest sang and made merry, “and 
if thy little legs will only grow as straight 
and as strong as my Antonio’s, and thy 


180 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


heart remain as faithful to old Nonna, the 
saints forgive me if I care very much whether 
thou be acrobat or priest 

For some reason known best to himself, 
but readily guessed by the clown and the 
rest of the older members of the circus, the 
swarthy peddler was not seen in Bagni di 
Lucca for many a day after. But Natale 
did not lose his dread of encountering the 
fierce eyes and the cruel knife until long 
after the circus troop had taken to the road 
again. 

Nothing in the world could have induced 
Mrs. Bishop, the English lady at Cutigliano, 
to touch the money returned with, what 
was to her, most astonishing promptness 
and honesty through Leo, one of the mu- 
sicians. 

In the first place, the notes were very dirty, 
much more so, she was sure, than when she 
had paid them to the clown a little more 


AT LAST 


181 


than a week before. Secondly, she would 
not reclaim money which had been once 
devoted to the cause of civilization and 
of education. If the “little ingrate” de- 
spised his opportunities and had finally 
returned to his “wallowing in the mire”, 
let the money which would have bought 
him for decency and for usefulness go with 
him. Thirdly — but this was not acknowl- 
edged even to Betty — the old lady’s heart 
had been touched by the tale Luigi the 
priest had come to tell her on the morning 
after the flight of the birdling. So her 
heart was not quite so hard as her words 
sounded, and she was in truth rather re- 
joiced, as well as very much relieved in 
mind, when Leo had arrived to tell of run- 
away Natale’s return to the troop in 
safety. Therefore, generously, Mrs. Bishop 
would not receive the money because it 
seemed to her no longer her own; surely 
Giovanni and Elvira and Nonna had kept 


182 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


their part of the bargain in giving up the 
child, while Natale had not even been 
consulted in their plan. 

The roll of notes was therefore returned 
by Leo to Giovanni, with the foreign lady’s 
instructions that the money was to be spent 
in providing meat for broth for the children 
so long as it should last. There would still 
be plenty of cold water always, free as air, 
for daily baths along the roads of Italy, and 
Mrs. Bishop hoped that Sora Grazia’s 
ministrations in that line would not soon 
be forgotten by Natale, who for one short 
week had been a scrubbed little lad. (It is 
safe to say that they were not !) 

Along with the money, Mrs. Bishop sent 
a school primer to Natale, with the ad- 
monition that he would at least try to learn 
to read while jogging up and down the 
earth and upsetting his stomach in all 
heathenish sports. 

But Madame Cioche and Betty rejoiced 


AT LAST 


183 


in open triumph over Natale’s freedom, to 
say nothing of the priest Luigi and the 
wise old gentleman who had in fact un- 
wittingly opened the cage door for flight. 

Sora Grazia was a trifle glum for a day or 
two at finding her pains thrown away upon 
the sulky little protege of the foreign lady, 
but as the month’s pay for his board and 
lodging had been in advance, and the 
nearly new clothes and shoes and cap were 
now thrown into the bargain by Mrs. 
Bishop, to repay her for her extra trouble, 
she too soon became content and even 
pleased with the ending of the rich lady’s 
scheme. 

So the bare front wall of the priest’s 
house in Cutigliano among the mountains 
has, as yet, no prospect of being adorned 
by a memorial tablet to a waif of all out- 
doors who was willing to be a great man in 
books and goodness. 

And Natale? 


184 


THE LITTLE ACROBAT 


Well, Natale is learning, better and better, 
how to turn his capitomboli over the dusty 
circus carpet, and he still feels II Duca’s 
pulse with sorrowful apprehension to the 
tune of the “ Dead March in Saul ” — by 
night among the oil lamps. 

By day, he trudges along hot white roads, 
under the marvelous blue of Italy’s sky, 
with Niero and Bianco for company. Or, 
he lies on the ground at Nonna’s side under 
some spreading tree in the camping-out 
times, sometimes spelling out words in a 
dog-eared primer, oftener gazing past the 
tree tops at the cloud-ships sailing over- 
head, while Nonna tells of Antonio’s wonder- 
ful childhood. 

By and by, when Natale grows too large 
to do the dying-horse act, and little Tito, 
or Gigi takes his place, he will be dashing 
with the horses around the ring. And then, 
in the still further and sweeter by and by, 
when Antonio’s agile legs will perhaps have 


AT LAST 


185 


begun to stiffen again, and the straight back 
to bend forward a little as he walks, who 
but Natale will be the shining star of the 
Circo Equestre, like another bespangled, 
pink-clad Antonio, with crisp brown curls 
and laughing eyes, and the nimblest, 
straightest legs in all Italy ? 













The story of a little patriotic Cuban girl 


LITTLE CUBA LIBRE 


By JANIE PRICHARD DUGGAN 
Illustrated. 282 pages. 12mo. $1.35 net. 


In all the big city of Havana there was no more patriotic 
little girl than Amada Trueno, daughter of one of the city 
gardeners. With all her heart she hated the Spaniards who 
ruled her beloved island of Cuba. “Little Cuba Libre” they 
called her when she stamped her foot and called the Spaniards 
enemies and tyrants. When she went to her cousin’s house 
in the country, although she played on friendly terms with 
the children of a Spanish planter, still her hatred of the op- 
pressors slumbered. IIow the Cubans finally revolted, and 
how little Amada herself took part in that revolution, even 
to the extent of bearing arms, is told in this charming story. 
“Little Cuba Libre” contains faithful pictures of Cuban life 
and Cuban people, and while written especially for young 
readers, its fine qualities should also appeal to older ones. 
Besides being an interesting story of Cuban girlhood it is a 
depiction of the very spirit of patriotism. 


little, brown & CO., Publishers 

34 Beacon Street, Boston 


Real stories of three famous elephants 


THE ADVENTURES OF 
MOLLIE, WADDY and TONY 

By PAUL WAITT 

Illustrated in color by Clara E. Atwood. 

75 cents net. 


Molly, Waddy and Tony are three of the most wonderful 
elephants in the world. Born in India, they have traveled 
all over Europe and our own America, showing their clever 
tricks to thousands of boys and girls. They were bought by 
the children of Boston and are now kept in the Franklin 
Park Zoo, where they will remain the rest of their lives. 

Mr. Waitt writes of their adventures when they were 
traveling, and tells of some tricks they played which their 
keeper never taught them. Little Tony is the roguish one, 
and he is always getting into mischief. That clever little 
trunk of his pokes into all sorts of places where it doesn’t be- 
long, and sometimes it takes Mollie, Waddy and Johann, the 
keeper, to make him behave as a proper little elephant should. 


“This is the most bewitching elephant story we ever read. 
It is the story of their travels through many countries. It is 
as good a story for boys and girls as any boys and girls will 
ever want to read.” — Journal of Education, Boston. 

“The story of ‘The Adventures of Mollie, Waddy, and 
Tony” is one of the nicest that little people who like animals 
can read.” — New York Times. 


LITTLE, BROWN & CO., Publishers 

34 Beacon Street, Boston 










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